Voting will be open tomorrow (Thursday) from 10 a.m. until 7 p.m. so students at the Richmond and Langley campuses can cast their ballots. (Kyle Vinoly photo)

Tomorrow (Thursday) will be the final day Kwantlen students can cast their vote in this year’s Kwantlen Student Association’s general election.

“Richmond is always really busy,” said Fran Schiffner, whose company oversees elections at the different Kwantlen campuses. “I think it’s because of where it is. It’s all in one building…I think there’s more exposure.”

Shiffner said this election has seen less of a voter turnout then in previous years.

“The last few [years] we’ve run out of ballots,” said Alice Rush, who works for Schiffner. “We need to get more people out to vote.”

Both women believe mid-terms and the Olympics may be distracting students from showing up.

Voting will be open until 7 p.m. tonight (Wednesday) and tomorrow, at Richmond and Langley campuses. Voting closed Tuesdays at Cloverdale and Surrey.

Fran Schiffner and Alice Rush are on hand to make sure every vote is cast fairly. (Kyle Vinoly photo)

The most alarming statistics to come out of the report are that 90 per cent of people who commit suicide have a diagnosable mental illness, and that suicide is the cause of death for 24 per cent of Canadians between 15 and 24 years of age, and 16 per cent of those between the ages of 20 and 29.

Women are twice as likely as men to experience depression, and although 80 per cent of people with depression respond well to treatment, 90 per cent of those with depression don’t seek treatment.

“Depression, sometimes it’s a blessing,” said Dr. Hamdy El-Rayes, director of the H.R. Mental Wellness Centre, “because it stops you in your tracks and makes you reflect on the way you’re going and what you need to do.

“Medication does not solve the underlying issues that caused the depression or anxiety.”

El-Rayes said he feels that Canadian youth should explore all options before turning to medication.

He believes that empowering those who have depression or anxiety, and encouraging them to take charge,, is the only successful way to heal someone. El-Rayes said that being younger is an advantage for people, because they have more time to work out issues and aren’t as set in their ways.

Growing up with the Internet and easy access to information has made this generation more open to new ideas, but at the same time has inundated them with too much information.

“Everything is new, and so younger people are willing to accept anything that will help them,” El-Rayes said. From what he sees in his practice, he feels that younger people ask more questions, hesitate to take something just because they’re doctor said to, and are more aware of medication side effects than previous generations were.

Canadians turn to medication more often than not. According to the Mood Disorders Society of Canada, Canadians are the largest users, on aper-capita basis, of psychiatric medications in the world. Canadians are also the secondlargest users of sedatives and the fourth-largest users of prescription narcotics in the world, according to the society. In 2006, there were 51 million prescriptions for psychiatric medications dispensed by Canadian pharmacies, a 32 per cent increase over the previous four years.

“You expect to be able to medicate yourself out of any problem,” said Paul Swingle, a Vancouver psycholo-gist, who argues that simply medicating a problem doesn’t address what caused it in the first place.

“That’s the alcoholic mentality, that you can avoid everything by getting plastered,” he said.

Swingle has seen the consequence of treating depression on the surface rather than at its source.

He has seen many women between the ages of 25 and 40 with a previously undiagnosed form of ADD known as High Frontal Alpha ADD. These women struggled in school, often couldn’t hold a job and, after becoming depressed, were put on a roster of medication to treat their depression. They went undiagnosed because the behaviour associated with the condition are talkativeness and flightiness.

“Since that fit our cultural stereotypes, these unfortunate young girls went undiagnosed,” said Swingle. “So they weren’t treated for the ADD, which created a reactive depression because of failure.”

The perception of drugs being the answer to emotional problems has been spread effectively by pharmaceutical advertising, which is legal in the U.S and Australia. But because American programing is prevalent on Canadian television, it’s common on our airwaves. A local therapist, Cindy Trevitt, said she feels that this is the greatest threat on the mental landscape for today’s youth.

“The implicit message is don’t feel bad ever, you should feel happy always and not experience life,” said Trevitt, a Vancouver counsellor. “It takes away from our ability to experience life. If I can feel sadness to its great depths I can also feel joy to its great heights.”

Trevitt argued that although today’s generation may be bombarded by this advertising, it is less influenced by it than previous generations.

Roy Wadia Director of Communications for the British Columbia Centre for Disease Control is confident Canada will be able to deal with the outbreak of H1N1, as it has with previous infections. (STOCK PHOTO/BCCDC)

“Because [avian flu is] not spread effectively between bird and human, it’s not a huge concern for most people,” said Roy Wadia, director of communications for the British Columbia Centre for Disease Control. “If it were to become of pandemic size, it could cause a catastrophic pandemic on a scale that would epically dwarf the current H1N1 pandemic.”

“Everything is ultimately local,” said Wadia. “If it’s happening in your neck of the woods, it’s a big story,” said Wadia. “If it’s happening in another country thousands of miles away, or even two or three countries away from you, it’s not a concern.”

Wadia, who was working in China during the original outbreak of avian flu in 2003, recalled that although it was a big concern in that area, it was of minimal concern in the West.It was not until the virus resurfaced in 2008 on Western farms and began having a direct affect on farmers and citizens that it received widespread attention. Since then, media focus has shifted again, but Wadia still sees avian flu as a huge public-health issue.

According the World Health Organization, there have been 442 documented cases of avian flu infection among people, with 262 of those cases proving fatal. Direct contact with diseased birds is believed to be the cause of most of these infections, and transfer from human to human has been rare. However, the potential for the disease to mutate or evolve and become more efficient in transferring is the largest concern for public-health officials.

West Nile virus is another infection endemic to various parts of the world. The virus first appeared in North America in 1999, but how it came to New York remains a mystery. Until then, the virus was found in Africa, Eastern Europe, parts of the Northern Mediterranean, Egypt, Israel, Romania and the Czech Republic. Upon its arrival in North America, it became the most widely spread vector-borne disease (spread by the bite of an insect or animal) on the continent, according to the BCCDC. To date, seven Canadians have reportedly contract the virus, two in B.C., two in Alberta and one each in Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Ontario. None of those people died.

A senior environmental health specialist for the BCCDC, Ken Cooper, noted that the original North American form of West Nile, designated NY99, has mutated, is virtually extinct and has been replaced by WN02, a closely related variation.

According to the BCCDC, only one in 150 people infected with the disease will respond strongly to it; others can carry it without ever knowing they had it. The centre reports that there were 4,511 cases of WNV reported in Canada between 2002 to 2008.

“There are serious side effects for those who become ill with neurological symptoms,” said Cooper an email interview. “Even those who get milder symptoms can still be quite ill and have an impact on health care and on economics.”

The economic cost of responding to avian flu has been felt by farmers around the world, who have had to slaughter their birds, including geese, ducks and chicken, to stave possible spread of the infection. In 1997, Hong-Kong destroyed 1.4 million chickens when a portion tested positive for the infection, according to reports from CBC. In 2007, a commercial duck farm in Regina executed 50,000 birds after some of them tested positive for H7N1, a variation of avian flu that does not kill people.

“Avian flu has a strong economic impact on people who are poultry farmers and [who] work in the agriculture field,” said Wadia. “From Vancouver’s perspective it’s no big deal right now, but if you see it from the perspective of a farmer in China, or a very large poultry processor in Thailand, it’s a huge deal.”

Wadia added he is confident the Canadian health community is well-prepared for H1N1.

Kwantlen alumni Cory Van Ieperen of Corycatures puts the finishing touches on a current student. (Kyle Vinoly photo)

Both new and returning students were greeted by slices of pizza and air brushed tattoos, when they walked through the doors of Kwantlen’s Richmond campus this week. The food and festivities are part of the Kwantlen Student Association’s Welcome Back Week, which gave students a chance to get familiar with the different services available this semester and get free food.

Students had to wait patiently for their pizza, which came from the Fresh Slice on Granville Street, because the location in the Lansdowne Mall was closed because of a planned power outage. Vanessa Knight, the director of student life for the KSA, hoped the event planned for Thursday at the Langley campus would go smoother. Students at the Cloverdale campus were to be treated to a pancake breakfast and guest speakers for the next month, said Knight.

Among the displays at Richmond was one from Apex Martial Arts, which is offering students 10 classes for $60, hosted at the Yyoga studio on the Richmond campus. “It’s an awesome deal for students,” said Marcy Hilario, assistant kickboxing coach and assistant kids martial arts coach at Apex. “Regularly, if you go to a martial arts studio it’s $25 for one class.”

A free drop-in session will be offered Wednesday, Jan. 13, with the 10 sessions starting the following week.

Hip-hop dancing and pilates will also be offered in the studio: for a complete schedule check the Student Health Improvement Plan’s website .

Amanda of Tattoos For Now was turning out the air brushed tattoos all day. She encouraged students to check out the web site and try out the tanning the studio offers. (Kyle Vinoly photo)

This student decided to go for something besides a panther, which the artist said was the most popular tattoo of the day.(Kyle Vinoly photo)

Students didn't seem to mind waiting for the free pizza to arrive from down town. (Kyle Vinoly photo)

There were student volunteers on hand to help guide curious students through the various booths. (Kyle Vinoly photo)

Vanessa Knight said that feeding the trade students at the Cloverdale campus is a frightening experience. (Kyle Vinoly photo)

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