The Lib Dems have unveiled plans to increase funding spent on mental health research by £50m, by 2020, as the party seeks to ensure it’s are treated as seriously as physical illnesses are. Here’s Nick Clegg:
“Mental health issues have been treated as a sort of Cinderella service compared to physical health issues. I want people who are dealing with depression to be as effectively treated as if they had diabetes. That is why I want to see Britain become the world leader in the next breakthrough in mental health research just as we have always been a country that is a world leader in research into physical health.
“We’ve led the world in research in physical health issues. We’re the country where penicillin was invented, where DNA was discovered, where IVF fertility treatment was developed, I see no reason why we can’t lead the world in mental health research and treatments as well. To that end, the Liberal Democrats will commit in our manifesto to a new research fund which, by the end of next Parliament, will be worth £50m per year.”
You can read the BBC News Online report here.
Better mental health is an issue that both Lib Dem ministers of health – first Paul Burstow, now Norman Lamb – have pushed within Government. You can read some of their posts (and those of others) on LibDemVoice here.
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7 Comments
The NHS idea of treatment for depression is symptomatic – CBT just makes it possible to function, but doesn’t solve the problems. Although, to be fair, being able to function is important. George Monbiot argues that if neo-liberalism doesn’t make you depressed, you’re either not paying attention or one of the elite. See http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/aug/05/neoliberalism-mental-health-rich-poverty-economy
So just possibly we could look beyond the individualised model of mental health as something that may or not be possessed by completely autonomous individuals, and consider the pressures and situations that people find themselves in and the effects that might have on their mental stability.
Very useful and pertinent comments Jenny.
Besides treating individuals suffering from mental health issues (early and without any stigma etc) the wider issues caused by global corporate and neo-conservatism must be looked at. More equal societies are more content and more healthy.
Good – but the rhetoric about a £50m increase in funding making the UK “the world leader” is ludicrous. On the figures in the BBC article, it would raise annual spending on mental health research to £124m.
For comparison, the research budget of the National Institute of Mental Health in the USA last year was $1,394m:
http://www.nimh.nih.gov/about/budget/fy-2015-budget-congressional-justification.shtml
Poor mental health certainly costs us billions a year, I think that’s unarguable. What can be done about it? In my own view economic inequality doesn’t help but more than anything the cult of the individual, me me me society has done major damage IMO. Yet the current LD leadership thinks that was one of the better things to come out of the 1980s.
Frank, do you have any evidence that “the current LD leadership thinks that [economic inequality] was one of the better things to come out of the 1980s”?
@Dave Page
I interpret Frank’s remarks as meaning that the “me me me society” is what the current LD leadership approves of. This is a society in which individuals focus on satisfying their desires directly and immediately, rather than indirectly and over time through cooperative actions that benefit society as a whole. It is a society that ignores the implications of the obvious fact that “we are interdependent beings living in a community”.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/religion/9873943/Me-me-me-culture-of-the-1980s-poisoning-society-warns-Sentamu.html
As a result of the austerity measures there is bound to be an increase in mental health problems as increasing numbers are are placed in increasingly more stressful work [or no work] situations and fewer and fewer are able to follow the career of their choice causing anxiety and/or depression. Both of these conditions will remain a problem as long as IDS, with his heartless approach, stays in his post. Since there is no obvious sign of an increase in decent jobs on the horizon – the best short-term solution is the replacement of IDS by someone with greater compassion.
There does seem to be some good news for those suffering with more complex conditions. Last month I did raise the issue of meditation as a route to confronting what is now described as ‘frozen trauma’ based on my own experiences – when a thread touched on the subject. It seems that this approach has been recognized with this ‘radical’ new treatment:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/you/article-2376132/TV-psychotherapist-Benjamin-Fry-devastated-depression-Then-discovered-radical-new-treatment.html