Joyce Echaquan: Indigenous access to health care still lacking three years later, advocate says – CityNews

Sep 24, 2023

Three years after the death of Joyce Echaquan, advocates say there remains a gap of accessibility and services in Quebec’s health-care system for Indigenous People.

Echaquan, a 37-year-old Atikamekw mother of seven, filmed and livestreamed hospital staff in Joliette making derogatory comments toward her as she died.

Her Sept. 28, 2020, death caused shockwaves in Quebec. It led to widespread protests in Montreal, with demonstrators urging the Quebec government to assert systemic racism existed in the province.

“Three years later, not much has changed. The trust in the system is still very much not there,” said Ghislain Picard, the Quebec and Labrador regional Chief of the Assembly of First Nations.

“This has been happening for so long. Joyce’s death was just that very tiny tip of the iceberg of a much broader problem.”

Picard firmly believes the video Echaquan took of the Joliette nurse and orderly is proof of systemic racism in the province. Quebec Premier François Legault has long maintained he disagrees with that stance.

Joyce Echaquan: Indigenous access to health care still lacking three years later, advocate says – CityNews

NationTalk Partners & Sponsors Learn More