CCLA has joined more than twenty organizations and experts calling on Correctional Service Canada (CSC) to reverse its decision to remove a number of common medications, used to treat depression, ADHD, and other conditions, from the list of drugs available to people in federal prisons. The changes were made without meaningful consultation with patients, clinicians, or the organizations that serve incarcerated people, and without explaining what evidence supported the decision.
The harm here is dual ended: to people’s health, and to their basic right to fair treatment. These are across-the-board restrictions that ignore individual needs and apply to people who cannot simply seek care elsewhere. CSC is legally required to provide health care of a standard comparable to what people receive in the community, and abruptly cutting off effective, prescribed treatment falls far short of that obligation.
Indigenous people, and Indigenous women in particular, are dramatically overrepresented in federal custody. These cuts will disproportionately affect them, and are at odds with Canada’s stated commitment to reconciliation and closing the pervasive gap in health outcomes for Indigenous people.
The coalition is asking CSC to pause any further changes, restore the medications it has removed, and open a genuine review and consultation with patients and experts. CCLA will keep pressing for a prison health system built around patients and their rights. Read the joint letter here.
