Why are police officers responding to wellness checks?? They are not even trained in this field. This why I say that the government put so much pressure on police to think they should do everything. When they have no clue what they are doing and always feel like they are ”threaten”. For example, before 1967 when someone was injured or in serious need of care the police were the ones who would put those people in the back of their small cars driving them to the hospital, which lead to multiple people dying in the back of their vehicle. This lead the government to think of a solution for this, since making the police do everything was not working. In 1967 that is when the first EMS practitioner happen. If they change the system back then why can’t they do it now? Since EPS announce 30% of the calls or mental health, addictions, homelessness, domestic abuse-related, so why don’t train social works or physiologist or people who are trained in that field answering 911 calls, and do the wellness checks? Since the beginning of April this year ,at least four people have died in Canada during police-involved wellness checks.
D'Andre Campbell, a 26-year-old Black man with schizophrenia, was shot dead on April 6 in Brampton, Ont., after calling Peel Regional Police himself for help.
Regis Korchinski-Paquet, 29, a Black-Indigenous woman, died after falling from a high-rise balcony in Toronto after her family called the police for help on May 27.
In New Brunswick, Chantel Moore, a 26-year-old Indigenous woman, was shot and killed by an officer on June 4 during a wellness check.
And on June 20, Ejaz Ahmed Choudry, a 62-year-old Pakistani immigrant who had schizophrenia, was shot and killed by police in Mississauga, Ont., during a wellness check.
In Kelowna BC Wang a nursing student, who has a history of anxiety, panic attacks, and self harming. Her boyfriend called the RCMP out of fear. Leading the RCMP to use excessive force and dehumanize and humiliate her infant of her own neighbour, during a wellness check
The use of police to deal with mental health crises shows that too many people are being failed by the mental health system. This shows that in the police system they consider mental health a joke. Defund the police the amount of money that goes into police can be used for community service that knows what the community needs.
EMS:https://www.ems.gov/OEMShistory.html
EPS Responses to more Mental calls:
https://twitter.com/Reakash/status/1270769588142137348
https://edmonton.ctvnews.ca/they-ve-absolutely-saved-lives-eps-crisis-response-teams-responding-to-more-mental-health-calls-1.4899514?cache=yesclipId104062
