The Government of Canada, in its August 1995 publication, Setting the Stage for the Next Century: The Federal Plan for Gender Equality, committed itself to a five-year plan for the promotion of gender equality. At the United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women held at Beijing in 1995, our Government endorsed the Beijing Platform for Action in which Canada reaffirmed its commitment to previous agreements, including the United Nations Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women.

All these documents contain pledges toward the promotion of the health care of older women. Canada has agreed to:

• review existing legislation, including health legislation, to reflect a commitment to women’s health and ensure that the legislation meets the changing roles and responsibilities of women
• implement gender-sensitive health programs, including decentralized health services that address the needs of women throughout their lives and take into account....the special needs of women with disabilities and the diversity of women’s needs arising from age
• take measures to eliminate harmful, medically unnecessary, or coercive medical interventions and over-medication of women
• develop information, programs, and services to assist women to understand and adapt to changes associated with aging, and to address and treat the health needs of older women
• address the health needs of senior women who are particularly vulnerable to relatively lengthy periods of chronic illness or disability, and who do not have adequate or appropriate health services and social support
• On the basis of the pledges, the Post Beijing Working Group has, in a number of communications to Health Canada, urged the Government to follow through on its commitment to women’s health. Health Canada further urged the Government to follow through on the commitments to women’s health.

Health Canada has taken steps to promote the well-being of older women, through the establishment of Centres of Excellence for Women’s Health and the Canadian Women’s Health Network. However, we remain deeply concerned about the situation of health care in Canada, and we urge the Government to protect Medicare and to meet its commitment to complete its plan by the year 2000.

This year, 1998, we intend to continue to lobby the Government on the implementation of the Beijing Platform to Action regarding women’s health, and to communicate our concerns to the health critics within each party so as to increase awareness on a broader scale at the federal level.

In addition, because of the downloading of responsibilities from the federal government to the provinces, and from the provinces to the municipalities, issues that were formerly solely federal may now be provincial and even municipal, and it may be that we should be lobbying governments at all levels.

Post-Beijing Working Group, April 30, 1998
Revised March 1999

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