This is a blog for the Mental Health Policy Class at the George Warren Brown School of Social Work.

January 25, 2007

Do You Have Time to Sign a Petition?

Take Action: First Things First: Make Missouri Health Care a Priority!: "Nearly 700,000 Missourians have no health insurance, including 106,000 children. In 2005, Missouri politicians continued to give away millions of dollars in tax breaks for insurance companies and corporations, while eliminating health coverage for 100,000 Missourians and cutting health services for over 300,000 more! Nobody in Missouri voted for that. We need to set this right and ensure that health care for children and families becomes a priority this year!"

January 22, 2007

U.S.-born Children of Immigrants May Have Higher Risk for Mental Disorders Than Parents

NIMH: U.S.-born Children of Immigrants May Have Higher Risk for Mental Disorders Than Parents: "In the first studies to examine the effects of immigration and years of residence on the mental health of Caribbean Black, Latino, and Asian populations in the United States, NIMH-funded researchers found that immigrants in general appear to have lower rates of mental disorders than their U.S.-born counterparts. A special section of the American Journal of Public Health published in January 2007 provides early findings from the National Survey of American Life (NSAL) and the National Latino and Asian American Study (NLAAS) on the prevalence of mental disorders and patterns of mental health service use among minority immigrants and later generations born in the U.S."

Depression Screening Saves Money for Employers

Clinical Psychiatry News: "For employers, the savings generated by a low-intensity depression screening and management program for workers more than offset the costs, according to Dr. Philip S. Wang of Brigham and Women's Hospital, Boston, and his associates.
The researchers examined the economic costs and benefits of a workplace depression intervention from the perspectives of society as a whole and of employers. They devised a statistical model comparing usual care—that is, care-seeking and treatment patterns that typically occur in the absence of a workplace program—with a program comprising a one-time workplace quick screen for depression followed by telephone “care management” by master's-level clinicians."

January 19, 2007

Universal Access in California?

Health care and the states The federalist prescription Economist.com: "Arnold Schwarzenegger, California's governor, this week announced a plan that could change the terms of America's health-care debate. The Republican in charge of the country's most populous state, where 6.5m people, almost one resident in five, lack medical insurance, said he wants to introduce universal health-care coverage.
His recipe is a combination of insurance-market reform, government subsidies and—most important—compulsion. “Everyone in California must have insurance,” Mr Schwarzenegger argued. “If you can't afford it, the state will help you buy it, but you must be insured.”"

January 7, 2007

Has the War on Drugs Been Lost?

This Is Your Brain on Drugs, Dad - New York Times: "Today, after 20 years, hundreds of billions of dollars, and millions of arrests and imprisonments in the war on drugs, America’s rate of drug-related deaths, hospital emergencies, crime and social ills stand at record highs. . . . . Why are so few Americans aware of these troubling trends? One reason is that today’s drug abusers are simply the “wrong” group. As David Musto, a psychiatry professor at Yale and historian of drug abuse, points out, wars on drugs have traditionally depended on “linkage between a drug and a feared or rejected group within society.” Today, however, the fastest-growing population of drug abusers is white, middle-aged Americans. This is a powerful mainstream constituency, and unlike with teenagers or urban minorities, it is hard for the government or the news media to present these drug users as a grave threat to the nation. "

A Surprising Secret to a Long Life

A Surprising Secret to a Long Life: Stay in School - New York Times: "The one social factor that researchers agree is consistently linked to longer lives in every country where it has been studied is education. It is more important than race; it obliterates any effects of income. "

India Prosperity Creates Paradox

India Prosperity Creates Paradox; Many Children Are Fat, Even More Are Famished - New York Times: "Presenting a confounding portrait of child health in India, new research commissioned by the government finds that despite the economic advances of recent years India’s share of malnourished children remains among the worst in the world. Paradox being pervasive in this country, the new data on child malnutrition comes even as public health officials confront what they call alarming levels of childhood obesity. "

January 1, 2007

FDA Approves Plan B's Over-the-Counter Sale

FDA Approves Plan B's Over-the-Counter Sale: "By the end of the year, American women will be able to walk into any pharmacy and buy emergency contraceptive pills without a prescription as a result of a Food and Drug Administration decision announced yesterday. The decision means women will not have to go to a doctor first as long as they can prove they are 18 or older to a pharmacist, who will keep the drugs behind a counter. Younger teenagers will still need a prescription, and the pills will not be sold at gas stations, convenience stores or other outlets that do not have pharmacists."

U.S. Urges HIV Tests for Adults and Teenagers

U.S. Urges HIV Tests for Adults and Teenagers - New York Times: "In a major shift of policy, the federal government recommended yesterday that all teenagers and most adults have H.I.V. tests as part of routine medical care because too many Americans infected with the AIDS virus don’t know it."

The Challenge of Global Health

Foreign Affairs - The Challenge of Global Health - Laurie Garrett: "The fact that the world is now short well over four million health-care workers, moreover, is all too often ignored. As the populations of the developed countries are aging and coming to require ever more medical attention, they are sucking away local health talent from developing countries. Already, one out of five practicing physicians in the United States is foreign-trained, and a study recently published in JAMA: The Journal of the American Medical Association estimated that if current trends continue, by 2020 the United States could face a shortage of up to 800,000 nurses and 200,000 doctors. Unless it and other wealthy nations radically increase salaries and domestic training programs for physicians and nurses, it is likely that within 15 years the majority of workers staffing their hospitals will have been born and trained in poor and middle-income countries. As such workers flood to the West, the developing world will grow even more desperate."

Mitt Romney on Health Care for Everyone

Featured Article: "Every uninsured citizen in Massachusetts will soon have affordable health insurance and the costs of health care will be reduced. And we will need no new taxes, no employer mandate and no government takeover to make this happen."

Calorie Shock at the Counter - New York Times

Calorie Shock at the Counter: "New York City's first-in-the-nation order to ban trans fats from all city restaurants has received wide attention. But the most important health dividends might well come from a less prominent measure that was also approved by the city's Board of Health yesterday: a requirement that fast-food restaurants post the calories in their offerings in large type and in readily visible positions. The likely shock when patrons realize just how many calories they are imbibing with their oversized burgers and fries or richly sweetened coffees may provide just the right impetus to propel overweight customers toward a healthier diet. "

Psychiatry: An Industry of Death?

Psychiatry: An Industry of Death - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia: "Psychiatry: An Industry of Death is a museum in Hollywood, California, USA. It is owned and operated by the Citizens Commission on Human Rights, an anti-psychiatry organization founded by the Church of Scientology."