New data from the Canadian Institute for Health Information indicates that more than half of young Canadians who accessed mental health services in the last six months say that the services were not easy to access.

Broken down further, three out of five people ages 12 to 24 with self-reported early needs were able to access mental health and substance use services.

However, Andrea Foebel, a spokesperson with CIHI, notes that those numbers also mean that two out of every five people were not able to access those services.

Of those who were able to access services, Foebel says the ability to get help differed by gender.

She says they found that half of boys and young men were able to access care. For example, she says that’s compared with 80 percent of transgender/non-binary people who were able to access care. She notes that men, in general, have less “health-seeking behavior,” while trans/non-binary people seek care at higher rates.