La Journée de la Francophonie, also known as Francophonie Day is celebrated every year in March and is based on the principles of humanity and respect for cultural and linguistic diversity for all.
Did you know that there are more than 82,000 Francophones and over 300,000 Francophiles in our province? Honouring our B.C. Francophone History is this year’s Francophonie Day theme recently announced by Adrian Dix, Minister of Health and Minister responsible for Francophone Affairs.
“Francophones and other non-English speakers have a growing need to access essential services—like health care—in their mother tongue or language spoken most often at home,” says Anne Stoll,
Francophone Services coordinator, PHSA. “We continue to work on expanding our network of support services to ensure our colleagues across the health care system as well as the language minority communities we work with find tools and services that are culturally adapted.”
“Our celebration of La Journée de la Francophonie is a reflection of our province’s linguistic history,” says Anne. “One that is rich in diversity and is reflected by our patient populations as well as the workforce across our health authorities.”
The
Provincial Language Service (PLS), a program of PHSA, provides interpreting and translation services to BC health authorities and physician offices across the province.
Visit the PLS page to learn more about how we help organizations provide services to their linguistically and culturally diverse clients including immigrants, refugees, official minority language speakers and members of the deaf, deaf-blind and hard of hearing community through high-quality interpreting and translation.