Scotland's mental health services face much the same fundamental problem as our physical health services: insufficient resources at a time of rising demand.
The scale of the crisis has been obvious for a long time. Around one in three GP consultations in Scotland relate, in whole or in part, to the patient's mental health and just a few weeks ago, the ScotCen Social Research study for the Scottish Government found more than one quarter of people had experienced a mental health problem. And prolonged austerity has made the situation worse - when people struggle financially; the worry and stress often take their toll on mental health.
We also know mental health services for young people have been under particular pressure. According to the Scottish Children's Services Coalition (SCSC), a campaigning group bringing together a number of organisations that work in the area, half of Scotland's health boards are failing to meet an 18-week Scottish Government waiting time target for treatment.
It is not the only pressing issue. Waiting times have also been increasing and there is no secure provision for under-18s in Scotland who need it. The SCSC says this means that young people are often being treated in unsuitable adult or paediatric wards, or being sent miles away from their families.
To tackle the crisis, the SCSC has been calling for extra funding from the Scottish Government - a call which this newspaper supports. The children's service providers behind the SCSC believe more money will help speed up diagnosis, cut waiting times, and prevent the use of non-specialist units. And with demand rising, it is obvious more money from government will be required if patients are to receive the timely and appropriate treatment they need.
But a demand for more money raises the question of where the money comes from and there is an answer, at least in part, in the extra funding announced in the Budget. Ever since the UK Government announced the extra £1.25bn for child and adolescent mental health services over five years, SCSC has been calling on the Scottish Government to ensure Scotland's share is spent to improve facilities to help children and teenagers. Now the group has launched a petition to pile on the pressure and the Scottish Government should listen carefully.
To be effective, the extra money will need to be focused tightly in on the areas that need it, and that means not just diagnosis and treatment, but also research, prevention, education and staffing. The Scottish Government is justified in trumpeting the fact Scotland is the only country in the UK with a target for waiting times for mental health services, but those waiting times emphasise how far we still have to go. Health boards will be much better placed to meet the targets if they have more money to spend on inpatient beds and more specialist staff.
But treatment is not the only area that needs more resources. If we are to seriously tackle mental health problems among children and young people, more also has to be spent on education and prevention. In particular, more money has to be directed into mental health research, an area that has suffered an overall drop in funding since the SNP took power.
But these are only a few of the constituent parts of a bigger problem. The SCSC has not held back in describing the scale of the crisis; mental health services in Scotland are at breaking point, they say, with 20 per cent of children and young people having a mental health problem in any given year, and about 10 per cent at any one time. At present, with waiting times rising, we are heading in the wrong direction on the problem; Scotland's share of £1.25bn, properly spent and focused on the areas that need it, will go some way to reversing that trend.
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