State Mental Health Cuts: A National Crisis
The National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) has released a report highlighting the funding changes that have occurred in public mental health services in each state since 2009. The report explains how states have dealt with budgets cuts, and offers policy recommendations on how to ensure the effective use of available resources.
For youth and adults living with serious mental illness, the consequences to the cuts include frequent visits to emergency rooms, hospitalizations, homelessness, entanglement with juvenile and criminal justice systems, the loss of critical developmental years, premature deaths and suicides.