In the wake of the Newtown, CT shooting, NRA chief executive Wayne LaPierre called for a national registry of those who are mentally ill. According to the Washington Post, the federal government does not possess the constitutional authority “to require state agencies to report data.” All the federal government can do is either offer or withhold funding, as it did in the wake of the 2007 Virginia Tech Shooting when it provided additional funding for state governments that shared 90 percent of their mental health records. But it seems that 38 states already maintain an active database that “require or authorize the use of” mental health records during gun background checks. And the Gun Control Act of 1968 does not allow sales of firearms to people who have been institutionalized or considered to be mentally “defective.”
For the purpose of firearms sales, I support the idea of maintaining a database of people who have been institutionalized. This could prevent a person from being a harm to himself or to others. I speak as a person who has been institutionalized for being a harm to herself more than once. If I’d had access to a firearm, I wouldn’t be here right now. There may be many others who are in the same boat.
The New York Times reported on mental health coverage through insurance. In any given year, 26 percent of adults have a mental disorder, and 6 percent of adults have a mental illness that prevents them from functioning, according to the NIMH. In addition, 21 percent of teenagers between the ages of 13 and 18 undergo a “severe emotional disturbance.” But it seems as though 85 percent of employers offer some kind of mental health coverage through insurance, and 84 percent of employers with more than 500 employees allowed access to in-network and out-of-network mental health treatment. Beginning in 2014, insurance plans will be required to cover mental health disorders as part of President Obama’s Affordable Care Act.
The New York Times notes that many psychiatrists, however, don’t accept insurance:
Plenty of psychiatrists in private practice accept no insurance at all, though it is not clear how many; their professional organizations claim to have no recent or decent data on the percentage of people in private practice who take cash on the barrelhead, write people a receipt and send them off to their insurance company to request out-of-network reimbursement if they have any at all.
My psychiatrist does not accept insurance. He writes me a receipt, and I am to seek out-of-network reimbursement, a claim that has been repeatedly rejected by my insurance. The NYT is right on the money in this instance. But I am happy with my psychiatrist and would rather pay out of pocket for him without reimbursement than to find another psychiatrist who is in network.
According to the San Francisco Chronicle, California is ahead of every other state in covering mental health services with public money. But as always, there are critics who say California does not go far enough, even though in 2004, California voters approved Proposition 63 that funnels $1 billion annually for mental health services by taxing the state’s highest earners. But funding is being cut, not just in California but also nationally, according to NAMI.
Overall, California cut $768 million from its state mental health services outlay during the past three fiscal years, according to a November 2011 report from the National Alliance on Mental Illness. California’s 21 percent reduction in mental health funding over that period is the seventh-highest among all states.
Nationally, states cut more than $1.6 billion in general funds from their state mental health agency budgets for mental health services since 2009, according to the 2011 report by the National Alliance on Mental Illness.
I’m not sure what can be done to stop funding cuts of mental health services when state budgets are slashing services across the board.
And finally, according to NY1 News, New York City Mayor Bloomberg has announced an initiative to get mentally ill people out of jail and into treatment facilities. The mayor’s office estimates that 36 percent of inmates suffer from some kind of mental disorder. The city initiative will attempt to “reduce incarceration rates, improve jail safety, and lower crime.”
depression introspection 