Post by Summre Blakely on Oct 24, 2016 18:21:24 GMT
This speaker really started to get me thinking about the lack of care in the United States for people with mental health issues. I did some research to see how bad the statistics were, but I never expected them to be so bad...
In America, one in five adults has a mental health condition. Youth depression rates have risen from 8.5% in 2011 to 11.1% in 2014, and 80% of these youths receive no treatment. More than half (56% to be exact) of American adults do not receive care or treatment for their mental health needs. All of these facts were taken from the 2017 report from Mental Health in America. Basically, America has a BIG issue, and no one is talking about it. In 2015 alone, there were 372 mass shootings according to BBC News. There were more mass shootings than there were days in that year. What has happened to mental healthcare in America to make our statistics this bad? In the decades before the 1990s, America was fairly proactive on mental health. In the 1940s, the National Mental Health Act was passed, which established the National Institute of Mental Health. In the 50s and 60s, the focus was on de-institutionalizing mental health issues and instead creating more community resources and programs so that mental health patients weren't so isolated and stigmatized from the rest of the community. In the 2000s, the main stance taken by the government was to raise awareness about rates of depression and bipolar disorder. While these actions all seem to have been successful, we are still experiencing a rise in mental health disorders and a decrease in the percentage of Americans with access to mental healthcare and treatment. Any ideas on what could be causing these disparities?
In America, one in five adults has a mental health condition. Youth depression rates have risen from 8.5% in 2011 to 11.1% in 2014, and 80% of these youths receive no treatment. More than half (56% to be exact) of American adults do not receive care or treatment for their mental health needs. All of these facts were taken from the 2017 report from Mental Health in America. Basically, America has a BIG issue, and no one is talking about it. In 2015 alone, there were 372 mass shootings according to BBC News. There were more mass shootings than there were days in that year. What has happened to mental healthcare in America to make our statistics this bad? In the decades before the 1990s, America was fairly proactive on mental health. In the 1940s, the National Mental Health Act was passed, which established the National Institute of Mental Health. In the 50s and 60s, the focus was on de-institutionalizing mental health issues and instead creating more community resources and programs so that mental health patients weren't so isolated and stigmatized from the rest of the community. In the 2000s, the main stance taken by the government was to raise awareness about rates of depression and bipolar disorder. While these actions all seem to have been successful, we are still experiencing a rise in mental health disorders and a decrease in the percentage of Americans with access to mental healthcare and treatment. Any ideas on what could be causing these disparities?
