Canada Following US on 988 Considered Likely
Canadian mental health advocates and telcos expect that country will act on establishing a three-digit suicide prevention and mental health crisis hotline, with 988 being the likely number. The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) should issue recommendations within weeks in its open proceeding about the feasibility of a three-digit suicide prevention number, Chairman Ian Scott emailed us. The U.S. 988 system went live nationwide in July (see 2207150036), and a variety of other nations have had similar three- and four-digit mental health hotline systems for years.
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"Everybody would be very surprised" if CRTC opts not to endorse a three-digit system using 988, Andy Kaplan-Myrth, TekSavvy Solutions vice president-regulatory and carrier affairs, told us. He said it might be confusing for Canadians if it decided otherwise since CRTC now requires telcos there to have an automated message for customers when they call 988, telling them it's not available in Canada and directing them to call the existing 10-digit national mental health hotline. That message suggests 988 is likely to happen in Canada, he said. He said going with a different number could also be confusing since 988 is starting to be promoted by U.S. media that Canadians also commonly consume.
“Canadians’ safety is of the utmost importance to our industry,” the Canadian Wireless Telecommunications Association emailed. It said its members are awaiting a CRTC decision about the final framework and timing. “Our members will work with all relevant stakeholders to ensure it is available to Canadians by identified timelines.”
Canada already has three-digit numbers for information and emergency response, and a three-digit mental health crisis line "is not out-of-the-box thinking," said Sheryl Boswell, Youth Mental Health Canada executive director. "It just makes sense." She said the 10-digit hotline -- 833-456-4566, operated by Talk Suicide Canada -- is relatively unknown, largely because suicide prevention is rarely discussed in Canada. A Canadian Association for Suicide Prevention spokesperson emailed that CASP doesn't "see any reason why a 3-digit number will not be implemented in Canada."
Timing of when a 988 system could go live in Canada is less clear. Boswell said 2023 might be realistic, with there being broad policy agreement across government that it's just waiting for the CRTC's decision.
For many carriers, the technical aspects already have been worked out, Kaplan-Myrth said. Most of the country could be turned on "almost immediately" because 988 already has been programmed into switches to send customers to the recorded message, he said. TekSavvy and some other carriers have started forwarding calls to the Talk Suicide Canada line along with doing the 988 messaging, Kaplan-Myrth said. But he said a 2023 implementation might be overly optimistic. There could be delays due to parts of the country where there isn't 10-digit dialing, and ramping up staffing for the national hotline also could be a hurdle, he said. He said it hasn't been decided where 988 calls would go, but that national hotline would seem to be the obvious clearinghouse. Kaplan-Myrth said Quebec has its own provincial hotline and there could be issues of forwarding that could slow coordination and implementation.
"We are moving quite quickly, but the process started long after that in the US," CRTC's Scott emailed. "There will be a decision in the coming weeks on the telecom regulatory aspects of implementing such a service, but there are other government players involved as well.”
Canada and the U.S. are following several nations that have three- or four-digit national suicide prevention phone numbers, emailed Brian Mishara, director-Centre for Research and Intervention on Suicide, Ethical Issues and End-of-Life Practices at the University of Quebec in Montreal. Brazil's Centro de Valorizacao da Vida mental health organization has 188. The Netherlands established 113 in 2020 for its suicide prevention hotline. France has 3114 and Taiwan 1925, Mishara said.
Australia has had a six-digit Lifeline system for years providing 24-hour support for suicidal thoughts and ideation, plus counseling support for mental health concerns, emailed Matthew Spittal, a professor at the University of Melbourne Centre for Mental Health.