INUIT ADDICTION CENTRE OPENS FOR ONTARIO INUIT

Ottawa centre helps Inuit strung out on booze, crack-cocaine and pot

OTTAWA--Tungasuvvingat Inuit, Ontario's Inuit community centre, is running
a first-of-its-kind treatment program for Inuit addicted to drugs and alcohol.

The treatment program, which got off the ground in mid-September, now has
11 Inuit clients, many of whom have lived away from Nunavut and Nunavik for
more than five years.

A three-storey, century-old brick house in Ottawa serves as the addictions
centre's base and is staffed by one full-time and one part-time addictions
counsellor. It's a day program that can take up to a dozen clients.

Tungasuvvingat Inuit's new program isn't a detox centre, but a full-fledged
program aimed at weaning addicts off their drug and alcohol habits, Ginette
Chouinard, the program's co-ordinator, said in an interview at the
Ottawa-based facility.

It's a far cry from the situation in Nunavut, where Inuit addicts have no
treatment programs at all. The territory's last treatment centre, a 14-bed
facility located in Apex that served the Baffin region, closed down in 1998.

Tungasuvvingat Inuit recognized a need for addictions treatment in Ottawa,
where about 900 Inuit live. Through 13 years of running outreach programs
for the homeless, a soup kitchen and employment counselling, it noticed
that many of the Inuit who use their services have drug and alcohol problems.

"The drugs of choice are alcohol, crack-cocaine, and pot. If mushrooms are
available they'll take them," Chouinard said.

Earlier this year Tungasuvvingat Inuit asked a consulting firm to study
four existing treatment programs for aboriginals to help model its own program.

The Inuit community centre wanted to craft a unique treatment regime that
would incorporate Inuit values and culture. They want to bring in elders to
help counsel the addicts, take clients out on the land and have
Inuktitut-speaking staff on hand.

Outside the house where the treatment program runs, a inuksuk stands in a
garden and caribou antlers hang from the roof. Inside, the house's walls
are adorned with Inuit art.

Reepa Evic-Carleton, an Inuk who has worked as a counsellor at
Tungasuvvingat Inuit since 1991, is responsible for the cultural side of
the addictions treatment program.

"One of things we'll be doing in the group sessions is lighting the qulliq,
which is very traditional. Down the road we'll try to do healing circles,"
Evic-Carleton said, sitting in the centre's pale yellow living room.

Because Evic-Carleton isn't a certified addictions counsellor, unlike
Chouinard, she'll team up with Chouinard to help out, especially with
unilingual Inuit.

So far, many of the pair's clients are women. Some have enrolled in the
program to prevent Children's Aid Services from taking away their children,
while others are required to be there by the courts. But a few, Chouinard
said, have come on their own.

The program is treatment oriented. Unlike some programs that simply offer
support to addicts, Tungasuvvingat's approach is to make the addict work at
kicking their habit.

Each client is assessed when they come through the door. The addictions
workers ask detailed questions about the person's drug and alcohol use,
health, sexual history, and family history.

Almost all the Inuit in the program attribute their addiction to having
been beaten or sexually abused as children. Homelessness and poverty are
also to blame, Chouinard.

A key piece of information she asks the addict is if they're ready to
tackle their problems. "It's treatment where people have to work at it,"
Chouinard said.

Right now, Chouinard and Evic-Carleton are focused on helping Inuit beat
their addictions. Later on, they'd like to start up an after-care program,
which would help clients stay sober and drug-free.