Today, as we drop off our kids worrying about #COVID19, remember that for 100 years, Indigenous parents had their kids taken by force “for their own good” to schools where they were denied their culture, insulted, beaten, not treated when sick and *half* died. #OrangeShirtDay2020

The last residential school closed in 1996. This is not ancient history. Many survivors walk amongst us today. Many families were irreparably harmed and so many children became adults denied a childhood. The immense trauma reverberates to this day. #OrangeShirtDay2020

In case you wonder whether our former governments and bureaucrats had good intentions that went wrong, rather than clearly racist and colonial ones, here are quotes from the Prime Minister and Duncan Campbell Scott the administrator re: residential schools. #OrangeShirtDay2020

This may be new to non-Indigenous settlers, but Indigenous people have been calling attention to the racist and genocidal policies they have endured for centuries. Their resilience is what brings us to today in an era of Reconciliation. We have to do the work. #OrangeShirtDay2020

In health care this means thinking about how history including segregated Indian hospitals, forced sterilization of Indigenous women and general distrust of the state impacts Indigenous people seeking care or choosing not to. We have to rebuild broken trust. #OrangeShirtDay2020