Canada’s government says it’s going to take a full look at how many veterans take their own lives after leaving the military.
The comprehensive examination is part of a National Defence and Veteran Affairs Canada’s suicide prevention strategy released on Thursday.
A Globe and Mail investigation in 2015 found that in addition to the 158 soldiers killed in the Afghanistan mission, at least 54 others soldiers and veterans killed themselves after returning home.
The department Thursday that 130 soldiers have committed suicide since 2010 while serving in the military.
However, it has struggled to keep track of veterans’ deaths because collecting information on because their medical files are spread across the country and fall under provincial jurisdiction.
“We have to do better,” Veterans Minister Seamus O’Regan said Thursday. “We recognize the dire need for a suicide prevention strategy.”
Beginning in December, Veterans Affairs and Statistics Canada will begin reporting on the rates of suicides among veterans.
Government officials say understanding where, how and when suicides take place will make a big difference.
The strategy cites over 160 initiatives that are underway or in development,
For some perspective, I contacted Don Leonardo, a third generation member of the Canadian military, who served as a Canadian peacekeeper in the former Yugoslavia in the early 1990’s
Leonardo is a long-time veterans advocate who is president of Veterans Canada, which has 8,000 members and is the second largest (after the Canadian Legion) veterans group in the
He spoke to RCI by phone from his home in Airdrie, Alberta.
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