Rabble: The housing crisis puts the emotional health of youth at risk

Moving in childhood correlates with a significantly higher rate of depression in adulthood, new data shows. The research was released Wednesday in JAMA Psychiatry, a monthly peer-reviewed journal published by the American Medical Association.

The research comes in the midst of a housing crisis in Canada. Figures from Statistics Canada demonstrate rent inflation has gone up 15 per cent since June 2022; meanwhile, wages have only gone up nine per cent in the same time period.

For those hoping to buy, prices are even steeper. Between June 2022 and June 2024, inflation for mortgage interests rates has shot up by 74 per cent.

A 2020 study published in the Canadian Journal of Psychiatry showed that, in Manitoba alone, depression cost the provincial government $400 million dollars per year and the federal $12 billion per year.

Displacement within the country may be on the rise, according to a report by ACORN Ontario. The report laid out data obtained from the Landlord Tenant Board which showed N12 and N13 eviction notices rose by 70 per cent and 300 per cent respectively between 2017 and 2022.

N12 eviction notices are filed when the landlord or their family wants to move into a unit. N13s are filed when the landlord is seeking to do renovations that require the unit to be empty. Evicting a tenant for the supposed purpose of renovations has spawned the new term: renoviction.

ACORN wrote more tenants are reporting predatory landlords misusing N12s as a means to renovict long term tenants as requirements for notice and compensation are less than when filing an N13.

As the federal government broadens universal pharmacare, healthcare costs will only go up if social determinants of health are not addressed. Privatizing public healthcare programs however is not the answer.

Steven Staples, National Director of Policy and Advocacy at the Canadian Health Coalition, said he found the number of people who cannot access necessary medication much higher than the amount of money the government would have to spend on the program in a May article by the Globe and Mail.

A position statement by the Canadian federation of Nurses Unions (CFNU) said privatization actually costs the government more because payments for the service need to account for profit margins.

“Private, for-profit health care facilities do not welcome public accountability and have been hampered by poor oversight and a lack of transparency,” CFNU wrote.

As more and more Canadians are priced out of buying homes, more and more people are exposed to the risk of renovictions from greedy landlords.

To mitigate future costs of widespread mental health issues in Canada, the article in Jama Psychiatry suggests governments start to prioritize policies that enable “settled childhoods.”

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Article by Gabriela Calugay-Casuga for Rabble