THE sheer number of awareness days, weeks and months vying for attention in the media can make it difficult for issues to get the attention they deserve.
I hope this Mental Health Awareness Week – which begins today - will be different. How could it not be after the huge outpouring of grief that followed the death of Scots singer Scott Hutchison, of the band Frightened Rabbit, who took his own life last week?
Perhaps it will be of some small comfort to Mr Hutchison’s devastated family and friends that his death has instigated a wide-ranging debate about mental health in this country.
READ MORE: Three quarter of Scots feel 'overwhelmed' by stress, new report finds
One thing that became painfully clear in the aftermath is just how many people have been affected by suicide. I can’t be the only one to have been genuinely shocked by the number of people on social media who have talked of their own experiences, either the family members or friends who had killed themselves, or their own battles with suicidal thoughts. A recent Samaritans poll indicated that 61 per cent of Scots have been affected by suicide. Can this really be true?
Another focus has been that Scotland clearly does not have the medical infrastructure to deal with the scale of the nation’s mental health problems, either at the acute end of the spectrum, where people are suicidal and need drastic medical intervention, or indeed at the other end, where the right treatment and support ensures a moderate depression does not morph into a complete breakdown.
Indeed, if anything, most of the experiences recounted have been marked by a similar story of overburdened mental health services letting people down, impossibly long waiting lists for talking treatments sending people even further down the depressive spiral, cuts to already threadbare services leaving patients and their families isolated and desperate, nurses and doctors signing themselves off for stress when they themselves simply can’t cope with turning people away.
The poor treatment of David Ramsay, who hanged himself aged 50 after being twice turned away from in-patient treatment in Dundee is only one recent case that highlights the depth of the problem.
READ MORE: Three quarter of Scots feel 'overwhelmed' by stress, new report finds
First Minister Nicola Sturgeon seemed genuine in her sadness at Mr Hutchison’s death, and her wish for people to open up and talk about their mental health problems. She talked over the weekend about her own coping mechanisms for stress and the importance of listening to others. What she didn’t deal with, however, was the reality on the ground when people do have the courage to speak up, the fact that should they require an appointment with a counsellor or psychologist – a relatively successful treatment route - the NHS waiting lists are often so long that patients have deteriorated significantly by the time they are seen. Anti-depressants help many people, but they rarely get to the deeper root of any mental health issue.
What’s the point of encouraging people to open up when there’s no help available when they do? Untrained family and friends can only do so much. But, as patients and many health professionals will tell you, our mental health services have been underfunded for decades, with young people often worse affected. And things are getting worse. We know that early intervention helps, that the right package of treatment and therapy saves lives (and money in the long term). What’s needed now is a significant expansion in services at both ends of the treatment spectrum, more nurses and doctors, psychologists and counsellors, more specialised in-patient units.
Sadly, some people can’t be helped, no matter how good the treatment. But most can, which is why it so utterly devastating when we fail them.
Though she probably won’t say this out loud, as Ms Sturgeon knows fine well that there’s no way the NHS funding model, already struggling to fulfil current commitments and deal with an ageing population, can afford the levels of investment outlined above.
So, do we just accept there’s nothing more we can do, that more young lives will be ruined and lost? Or do we look for different solutions to pay for the treatment? I believe we should use this Mental Health Awareness Week to focus on the latter.
READ MORE: Three quarter of Scots feel 'overwhelmed' by stress, new report finds
And I’ll put my money where my mouth is by backing a recent proposal by former Tory minister David Willetts for those over 65 to pay an extra “NHS levy” on national insurance contributions.
By doing this, older people - many of whom have benefitted so generously from the property market - would pay directly towards their social care. This in turn could free up NHS resources to be put towards mental health services for younger people. Such inter-generational sharing of wealth is badly needed and I can’t think of a more symbolic gift from the Baby Boomers to the struggling generations that come after them than support for mental health.
Don’t agree? Well, let’s hear your funding suggestions. Seriously. Perhaps if we come up with some workable ones, our politicians will listen. And act.
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