Thank you, Mr. Speaker. This government spends a lot of money on sending people South for addiction treatment and, when they come back, we have resources to support them, but one thing that I've heard from some of the people is that they're looking for a place to go, whether it be for a day, an hour, a week, when they feel that they may relapse. I would to ask the Minister of health if her department is willing to take a look at maybe identifying a centre or addressing that somehow, so people don't have to leave the Northwest Territories when they feel like they're going to relapse, but where they have a place to go, a safe place to go and get some treatment. Thank you.
Thank you, Member for Hay River South. Minister of Health and Social Services.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. That's an interesting idea, and I understand the intent there, to sort of have what they are now calling a "circuit breaker" so that, if somebody has had a slip, rather than going back into a full 28-day treatment program, there would be a shorter and more immediate intervention. That is something that I would certainly be interested in talking to the Member about. Thank you.
I thank the Minister for considering that. What I would expect is that, you know, we don't look at it being in just one community. I don't expect we have to spend a lot of money on it, but we should have something in the south and something in the north, as well, just so that people have easy access. So I would just ask the Minister that she consider that, as well.
We are currently looking at ways to strenghten after-care, as you know. We've just started with our survey of people who have used our services to find out how well it worked, what else could be done. This is something we will certainly put into the consideration. It is a serious commitment of our mandate, to improve after-care services, and this is a potentially promising way of doing that.
