Congress Passed Mental Health Parity - Famous People w/ Mental Health Issues

Videos

Notebook: Mental Health

see larger video

sourced by Amy Judd

• 

  Created by Amy Judd | add comment

• 

  Created by Sanjay Jha | add comment

• 

  Created by Sanjay Jha | add comment

American Psychological Association announced that Americans have reason to be optimistic about achieving mental health insurance equity.  This is exciting news for all mental health care advocates, as well as human rights advocates everywhere.  Representatives in the House and Senate from both sides of the aisle have already come together this year and passed two important bills that benefit the mentally ill, disabled, and elderly citizens.

Congratulations, Representatives, for Responsible Government!

An excerpt from APA's press release is below.

*********************

American Psychological Association
October 4, 2008

APA Praises House and Senate for Historic Parity Legislation

Congress passed mental health parity today, taking a great step forward in the decade-plus fight to end insurance discrimination against those seeking treatment for mental health and substance use disorders. The legislation is part of the new bill that includes tax extenders, changes to FDIC limits and the financial rescue plan. When enacted, this legislation will require that health insurance equally cover both mental and physical health. The American Psychological Association (APA) praises the U.S. House and Senate for its leadership and bipartisan support of the legislation and President Bush for his commitment to signing the bill into law.

“With the passage of this bill, insurance companies can no longer arbitrarily limit the number of hospital days or outpatient treatment sessions, or assign higher copayments or deductibles for those in need of psychological services,” said psychologist Dr. Katherine Nordal, APA’s executive director for professional practice . . . . .

According to the National Institute of Mental Health, more than 57 million Americans suffer from a mental health disorder. According to a 2008 nationwide survey by Harris Interactive in conjunction with the APA, 25 percent of Americans do not have adequate access to mental health services and 44 percent either do not have mental health coverage or are not sure if they do. Additionally, a 2006 survey from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Agency reports that 49 percent of U.S. adults with both serious psychological distress and a substance use disorder go without treatment.

“Research shows that physical health is directly connected to emotional health and millions of Americans know that suffering from a mental health disorder can be as frightening and debilitating as any major physical health disorder,” said Dr. Nordal. “It’s our hope that passage of this bill will force our health care system to finally start treating the whole person, both mind and body.”  (See link for full article)
http://www.healthinformer.net/americans-one-step-away-from-receiving-mental-health-coverage.html

*********************

MARY'S COMMENTARY

Like other health problems, mental illness strikes people from all walks of life, including the rich and famous as well as average citizens.  Consider the famous persons listed at these websites who were diagnosed with mental health disorders:

Great Men with Mental Health Disorders
www.twilightbridge.com/icons1/iconshomepage.htm
The index of great men with mental health disorders, like Winston Churchill, Abraham Lincoln, Ludwig Van Beethoven, Issac Newton, Vincent Van Gogh and many more . . .

Celebrities with Bipolar Disorder
http://www.realmentalhealth.com/bipolar/bipolar_celebs.asp?gclid=CKSnvurmlZYCFRKIxwoduFV8nQ

·  Buzz Aldrin (astronaut)

·  Adam Ant (musician)

·  Ludwig van Beethoven (composer)

·  Napoleon Bonaparte (political leader)

·  Tim Burton (artist, director)

·  Lord Byron (poet)

·  Dick Cavett (television journalist)

·  Winston Churchill (politician)

·  Charles Dickens (author)

·  DMX, Dark Man X (Earl Simmons) (musician, actor)

·  Robert Downey Jr. (actor)

·  Richardy Dreyfuss (actor)

·  Patty Duke (actress)

·  Ralph Waldo Emerson (author)

·  Carrie Fisher (Actress, writer)

·  Larry Flynt (publisher, activist)

·  Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald (Writer)

·  Connie Francis (singer)

·  Stephen Fry (actor, comedian writer)

·  Peter Gabriel (musician)

·  Alan Garner (novelist)

·  Matthew Good (musician)

·  Philip Graham (publisher, businessman)

·  Macy Gray (musician, actor)

·  Graham Greene (English Novelist)

·  Ivor Gurney (English composer, poet)

It has been found that diffabled persons are often more creative than the general population, including people like Sean LeVert, Congressman Patrick Kennedy (D - RI), Elvis Presley, Britney Speers, and Nicholas Traina, son of novelist, Danielle Steel.

Roughly 1.25 million Americans with mental dysfunctions are currently imprisoned for crimes that they may have had little reasoning ability to avoid committing.  Some incarcerated mentally ill citizens are jailed on lunacy warrants and have committed no actual crime.  Once in prison, mental patients generally suffer harsher incarceration, including solitary confinement for up to 23 hours per day.  Prison guards frequently use potentially dangerous methods for controlling these sick inmates, including gas, Taser weapons, Restraint Chairs and Restraint Tables.  

How many Van Goghs are today shackled to their bare, metal prison racks?  How many plain Janes, who have no special talents and abilities, but would likely be capable of returning to normal lives in their communities with the right psychiatric treatment and other support?

Whereas this writer commends our representatives for making excellent strides on behalf of America's mental patients who are free in society, the legislation passed thus far in  2008 does little or nothing to improve the lives of America's incarcerated mental patients and achieve prison release for them.  Niether does it address the plight of acute mental patients who suffer a higher return rate to prison than the rest of the population.  

The high incidence of mental patients not willingly staying on their treatment programs after hospital and jail release may be attributed to a condition described below.

Anosognosia is a condition in which a person who suffers disability due to brain injury, seems unaware or denies their handicap. This may include unawareness of quite dramatic impairments, such as blindness or paralysis.

Another definition is ‘a deficit of self-awareness related to cognitive and behavioral impairments due to brain injury.’

Unless and until enforced treatment is mandated for mental patients exiting jails and prisons, our ratio of mental patients suffering behind bars (with little or no psychiatric treatment) will continue to be higher than those mental patients who are living free in society to benefit by 2008 legislation:  Medicare Mental Health Parity Bill (July); increased protections for disabled Americans in their workplaces (September); and the historic insurance parity legislation that Congress passed on October 4.

Congressmen and senators from both sides of the aisle have worked together to pass three important pieces of legislation in 2008, which were needed to better support America's mental patients in our society.  This writer and members of Assistance to the Incarcerated Mentally Ill hope that our representatives soon address the nation's high rate of incarceration for acute mental patients and take positive steps to achieve prison release for the non-violent mental patients presently imprisoned, under strict mandates that such released prisoners continue psychiatric treatment throughout their probation or parole periods.  Those mental patients who are presently incarcerated for violent crimes should serve out their prison sentences in secure mental hospitals, unless and until their psychiatrists and the sentencing court agree on an earlier release date, also with their freedom conditional to mandatory treatment provisions.

The unfortunate truth is that most mental patients who commit crimes, from disturbing the peace to murder, do so because they have exercised their legal option to discontinue prescribed psychiatric treatment.  Remove that option, and remove much of the problem.  Not only would this save the patients and their families undue stress and needless incarceration, but it would also reduce taxpayers' current costs of $185 billion annually which is spent on imprisoning 2.3 million Americans.  That figure does not include the millions of dollars taxpayers pay annually for wrongful death and police abuse lawsuits connected with the abuse and deaths of mental patients at the hands of law enforcement and while incarcerated.

See what voters think about the need to decriminalize mental illness at the links below:

Prisons or Hospitals for Acute Mental Patients?
http://www.surveymonkey.com/sr.aspx?sm=UEy3jTvmr4Oi3bhWk5djlKNKMmDO0fPWb7dTDZURhKg_3d

Read the comments of petitioners requesting an investigation into the secret arrest and death of a mentally ill heart patient, Larry Neal:

Petitioner Comments under "Signatures"
http://www.petitiononline.com/Neal/petition.html

IT IS SIMPLY CHEAPER AND MORE HUMANE to treat mental disorders as the health conditions they really are, rather than continue to criminalize mental illness in America.

*********************

Mary Neal
Website:  http://wrongfuldeathoflarryneal.com

Assistance to the Incarcerated Mentally Ill