“The best way to do it is by ourselves, for ourselves.”

Dr. Janet Smylie has dedicated much of her over two-decade career as a Métis physician and leader in the field of Indigenous health to shedding light on the injustices Indigenous people face in Canada’s health-care system.

It’s why Indigenous Services Canada will be working with her on short-term and long-term analysis of data on the novel coronavirus pandemic’s impact on Indigenous communities, in an effort to address some of the data gaps that exist between Indigenous populations on and off reserve.

“It’s a broken system,” said Smylie.

“Even though there are all these jurisdictional divides in this health information system where it’s way harder to identify our people with COVID in cities, now people are trying to work together and admit there’s gaps. We need to bring things together.”