Mental Health Month: The Crisis Continues in 2014

May is Mental Health Month: The Crisis Continues

The world and US keeps on inching towards progress in provision of mental health services to 450 million (World Health Report Geneva October 4 Report) estimated to be afflicted with a disability which makes others run away from it. In this month we need to remind ourselves of the barriers and problems to the treatment and justice  for those who are afflicted with highly debilitating and the most misunderstood disease in the world. We need to do that to offer hope to mentally ill and assuage people like me who are always angry with the injustice done to this population which generally lives in shadows. Some highlights are:

·         Stigma, misinformation, discrimination and neglect continue to prevent treatment of mentally ill.

·         Tradition ridden and ignorant segments of society continue to equate mental health problems to personal failure. This dogmatic belief is the most important impediment to treat mentally ill.

·         The policy makers all over the world are scared of cost of treatment of mentally ill, while ignoring the cost of this disability to the society which is much greater. It is one of the top disabilities over the world.

·         This continues to be a belief in society that mentally sick persons cannot lead productive lives. This is a myth propagated by ignorant or those interested in perpetuating the currently broken system. It is well known in medical community that with proper medical and psycho therapeutic care , 80% of schizophrenics and 60 % of those afflicted with depression  can lead productive lives. (WHO Report).  

·         As a result of this callousness to 450 million persons in the world, 40% of countries of the world have no mental health treatment. 25% do not have the basic drugs to treat mental health. On average there is 1 Psychiatrist per 100,000 people all over the world.

·         The prevalence of mental health over such a large scale perpetuates the cycle of poverty. Some mental ailments may emanate from the stresses and strains of being poor and homeless.

Nearer home in USA one does not find the situation any better. Our hospitals overmedicate routinely after a brief examination. The hospitals have no beds and no safety net for mentally ill once diagnosed and sometimes misdiagnosed. The deinstitutionalization with all the good intentions to award rights of mentally ill the right to live in a free society was botched in a big way. E Fuller Torrey a known mental health advocate has stated that the number of beds per 100000 persons in US is too low. Currently it is 14. He estimates that that it would suffice to make it 50. Joe Nocera, a NY Times columnist has summed it up well “What happened to the patients who left the hospitals after deinstitutionalization was horrendous. State mental hospitals would release patients with little idea where were they going. They often ended up on the streets, or in prison, which have become today's de facto mental hospitals".

In last 6 months we witnessed a rerun of this terrible movie in my hometown of Las Vegas in Nevada. They were dumping patients to California with 3 days of medications.

I have been associated with mental health for last 25 years and had hard time in containing my anger over this dismal state of mental health in our country. I am also the last person to lose hope over this. Here are some of the steps those members of society who can devote time to goodwill of disabled and those associated with mental health can take:

·         Make advocacy a part of your daily regimen. Take it up with legislatures, legislators, state and federal governments and utilize all legitimate forums for this purpose.

·         Assist your neighbors and communities by educating them about treatments, stigma and help wherever needed.  

·         Speak out when you notice homeless and use all available forums to highlight the callousness of the society.

·         Educate your friends and family members on mental health.

·         Emergency rooms at the hospitals make mentally sick persons wait for very long times. If you come across such a situation, advocate for them and get them help.

·         Never forget the election time. Force our representatives to spend more time and energy on mental health issues.

·         And last but not the least display your outrage on your sleeve and yell if you need to seek justice for the mentally ill.