Mental Health – The Cost of Inaction

HomeMental Health – The Cost of Inaction

When organizations talk about investing in training and mental health support, the conversation is often framed around values — doing right by the people who serve. That matters. But there is another conversation that needs to happen, and it belongs in the boardroom and the budget meeting.

The cost of not investing in your people’s readiness and recovery is not hypothetical. It shows up in your workers’ compensation claims, your disability payouts, your recruitment budget, and your legal settlements. The data is clear — and much of it comes from right here in Canada.

Mental Health - The Cost of Inaction

Data key:   🇨🇦 Canadian Data     🇺🇸 U.S. Data (Canadian national equivalent not publicly available)

1. The Mental Health Crisis Is Already in Your Budget

Psychological injury is not a fringe issue among Canadian first responders and military personnel. It is a systemic one — and it carries a measurable financial cost that most agencies have never fully calculated.

🇨🇦 44.5% 

Of Canadian public safety personnel show symptoms of at least one mental health disorder — more than four times the rate of the general population (10.1%). This includes police officers, firefighters, paramedics, correctional workers, and dispatchers.

Source: Frontiers in Organizational Psychology — WSIB Mental Stress Claims Study, Ontario 2017–2021

🇨🇦 16,000+

First responders in Ontario alone are projected to have PTSD by 2040 — up from an estimated 13,000 today. Ontario saw 1,420 new WSIB mental stress injury claims from first responders in 2021 alone, a number that has grown significantly since presumptive PTSD legislation passed in 2016.

Source: Frontiers in Organizational Psychology — WSIB Mental Stress Claims Study, Ontario 2017–2021

🇨🇦 1 in 3

Canadian first responders will develop PTSD during their career — a rate comparable to combat veterans. Public Safety Canada has identified this as a national crisis requiring coordinated action across all levels of government.

Source: Public Safety Canada — Action Plan on Post-Traumatic Stress Injuries

🇺🇸 $232B+ USD

The estimated annual economic burden of PTSD in the United States — approximately $19,630 per person affected. No equivalent Canadian national figure is published, but with over 13,000 Ontario first responders currently living with PTSD, the proportional cost to Canadian agencies is substantial.

Source: Myomnia Health — Cost of Psychological Injury in First Responders

The biggest cost driver is not the price of treatment. It is the untreated psychological injury. Leaders who treat mental health costs as someone else’s problem are simply deferring expenses to next year’s budget, next year’s overtime, or next year’s recruitment crisis.

— Myomnia Health, Cost of Psychological Injury in First Responders

There is also a hidden cost that almost never appears in agency reports: presenteeism. Research shows that 46.7% of first responders go to work sick or injured rather than use sick leave for mental health reasons. They show up — but they are not fully there. In this work, that gap has consequences.  Myomnia Health — Cost of Psychological Injury in First Responders

2. Turnover Is Costing You More Than You Think

When a team member leaves — whether through burnout, early retirement, or a stress-related disability claim — the cost of replacing them is significant, and it extends far beyond the recruitment advertisement.

🇺🇸 $189,000+

The estimated cost of recruiting, training, and bringing a new officer or firefighter to full operational productivity — including lost institutional knowledge. No equivalent Canadian national study has been published, but given comparable salary structures and training timelines, the figure is directionally consistent for Canadian agencies.

Source: Myomnia Health — Cost of Psychological Injury in First Responders

🇨🇦 3 years

The approximate time it takes for a newly hired Canadian firefighter or paramedic to reach full operational effectiveness — meaning that every departure doesn’t just cost money upfront, it costs the agency years of reduced capacity.

Source: Canadian Association of Fire Chiefs — State of the Fire Service in Canada

🇺🇸 37.4%

Of first responders have considered leaving their job due to stress or burnout — with more than 1 in 4 considering early retirement for the same reasons. Canadian surveys show comparable trends, with mental health cited as the leading driver of early departure in multiple provincial studies.

Source: Myomnia Health — Cost of Psychological Injury in First Responders

🇺🇸 20–30%

Annual voluntary turnover rate among paramedics and EMTs — one of the most persistent human resources crises in emergency services. Canadian EMS services face similar retention challenges, particularly in urban centres.

Source: EMS1 — Turnover: The Cost of Replacing an EMT

Turnover is not just a human resources problem. It is an operational readiness problem. Every experienced team member who leaves takes years of institutional knowledge, community trust, and hard-won judgment with them. That cannot be replaced quickly, and it cannot be replaced cheaply.

3. Legal Liability: The Bill for Impaired Judgment

There is a direct, research-supported link between untreated psychological injury and impaired decision-making in the field. Impaired judgment elevates incident risk — and incident risk becomes legal exposure. Canada is not immune.

🇨🇦 $30M+

Paid by the City of Toronto in police misconduct settlements between 1998 and 2005 — covering more than 8,000 cases including excessive force, false arrest, and negligent investigations. Toronto’s Police Services Board chair called it ‘an inordinate amount of money’ at the time. Settlement costs have continued to grow since.

Source: CBC News — Toronto Spent $30M on Police Settlements

🇨🇦 $200M+

Paid by the federal government in RCMP harassment class action settlements — $125 million to female officers and employees, and a second $100 million fund for those in non-policing roles. Both settlements arose from systemic failures to address misconduct and protect personnel from psychological harm.

Source: CBC News — RCMP Harassment Settlement

🇨🇦 $1.3M

The cost to Toronto taxpayers of suspended police officers in paid leave in 2024 alone — a hidden operational cost that accumulates when misconduct is not proactively addressed through training and psychological support.

Source: CBC News — Toronto Police Suspension Costs

For scale — what this looks like at the national level:

Canada does not publish aggregated national police misconduct settlement data. The figures below are U.S. equivalents, included to illustrate the scale of what this problem costs when left unaddressed at a systemic level.

🇺🇸 $3.2B USD

Paid out by the 25 largest U.S. police departments in misconduct settlements over the past decade — with excessive force and false arrest accounting for the highest totals.

Source: Washington Post — Repeated Police Misconduct Cost Taxpayers $1.5 Billion

🇺🇸$300M+ USD

Spent annually by U.S. cities on police misconduct settlements alone — funds diverted from education, healthcare, infrastructure, and community programs. The pattern in Canadian cities, while less comprehensively tracked, mirrors this trajectory.

Source: Express Legal Funding — Financial & Social Costs of Police Misconduct

These numbers represent more than financial loss. They represent the accumulated cost of teams operating under conditions that were never properly addressed — stress, trauma, and psychological strain that went unacknowledged until it expressed itself in the field.

PTSD is directly associated with impaired judgment that elevates incident risk, workers’ compensation claims, and potential legal exposure. The connection between unaddressed trauma and use-of-force liability is not speculative. It is documented.

— Myomnia Health, Cost of Psychological Injury in First Responders

4. The Shift That Changes Everything

The research is consistent: agencies that treat mental health investment as a line item they can defer are not saving money. They are accumulating it as hidden risk — in next year’s overtime budget, next year’s disability claims, next year’s recruitment crisis, and next year’s legal settlements.

The alternative is proactive training that builds resilience before a critical incident occurs. It is structured, clinician-led recovery support when one does. And it is a partner who understands both — and can deliver both with the realism and precision this work demands.

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