There have been many casualties as a result of the Covid pandemic. One of the most notable is mental health. Sure, it’s talked about a good deal more, but that’s about all. What are the true results of our children being locked down away from formal education and their friends? What are the true results of people’s quarantined businesses closing due to the lock down laws families in crisis? Sadly, these seems only to be a very superficial look on the real issues related to mental health issues that these decisions may have brought about. The debate at this moment seems to be focusing on the results of the economic effects of the pandemic, however this could not be further from where the real issues need must and should be focused.
The Covid numbers do no doubt warrant concerns. At the time of writing this, the total number of Covid cases are as follows: 131,380 total cases nationwide. There have been 1461 deaths attributed to the pandemic. For this we have locked down entire cities for months on end. Closed our states and international borders, and quarantining travellers for 14 days isolation at a time. Covid is no doubt extraordinarily contagious malady; yet it is a disease for the most part you must go and get tested to know that you have it.
At this point I would like to draw your attention to a much more alarming set of figures. The figures are not just startling, they are deeply distressing and should by any decent reckoning be a major national crisis, yet sadly it isn’t. Why?
In Australia there are over 2.2 million people living with moderate to severe mental illness. There are 690k Australian’s living with complex and enduring mental illnesses like bi-polar and Schizophrenia. Despite these figures, of the $2.3b in extra funding for mental health announced by the Federal Government in the 2021/22 Budget – NO additional funding has been allocated to mental health research. The government has committed to spend a total of $311bn to fight Covid-19, including $20bn on health support and $290bn in economic stimulus, but nothing for the mental illness pandemic that is growing and engulfing our nation.
Although Australia’s health system is frequently lauded as one of the best in the world, such assessments do not sadly include mental health, where Australia’s performance is far from world class.
There is no doubt that the pandemic has now increased the community’s risk of suicidality and mental illness associated with anxiety, depression, social isolation, financial distress, unemployment, and educational dislocation.
Given the funding, given the resources, given the population demand, Australia’s mental health system could be summarised thus: there are services providing mental health care that is awful, even dangerous; there are many places providing care that is at best adequate and typically short-term; and there are isolated pockets of well- intentioned and/or quality mental health care. Mediocrity shouldn’t be the benchmark. There is now real and urgent need for a radical shift in the way we plan for and respond to mental ill-health across the board in Australia.
Whilst well meaning, this approach, fails to meet our national needs currently, takes no account of the new COVID-19-induced challenges and does not support active investment in growing ‘Australia’s Mental Health’ across the nation.
The pandemic has provided a definitive message. Business as usual approaches that prioritise traditional, very centralised, top-down, mental health planning mechanisms just will not work and are not good strategies. Repurposing the past is not an option. Consequently, there is an urgent need to design a contemporary, responsive, and effective mental health system, that learns from the past but is fit for Australia in the 21st century not the 20th.
Bernard Curry Ambassador One in Five
Gabrielle Sheehan, Chair for One in Five said, “If Australian’s are genuinely serious about improving the mental health of Australia, then its time our governments get serious about properly funding neuroscience research. Awareness alone will not improve health outcomes for the 690K people living with complex mental illness.”
Less than 1% of total expenditure by the Federal Government supports the actual ‘science’ of mental illness, the core reason One in Five was founded by the Wardlaw family in 2004 following their son Matt’s suicide on New Year’s Eve 2001 and recognising that Matt had suffered intolerable depression for most of his life, his family and friends believed that awareness campaigns (whilst good at raising awareness and reducing stigma) would not have changed Matt’s outcome. Instead, they determined that the answer must be in the science. Commencing a long-term partnership with Prof. Suresh Sundram, Head of Psychiatry, Monash University, One in Five set out on a journey to answer the ‘why’s’ of mental illness through novel biological research.
You can help. Join One in Five for their fundraising mission One in Five is still the only volunteer-based, mental illness not-for-profit in Australia with the single focus of advancing novel medical research to turn one in five, into none in five.
You can be part of the of the journey. Visit the website to join their vital cause. www.oneinfive.com.au
Whilst your there, why not buy the 2021 HOPE t-shirt it was designed in kind by the team at Nick + Nardo and is available. The HOPE Adult t-shirt $35 + Shipping | HOPE Child t-shirt $25 + shipping.
100% of the proceeds will go directly into funding the next vital pieces of research into mental illness.
Here are some personal messages from the dedicated neuroscientists that are supported by One in Five,
Ariel : “In my research, I hope to find an accurate and affordable way to detect specific changes in the brain BEFORE symptoms of mental illness develop”
Wittaya: ” I hope to provide precise genetic-based treatments to those who are suffering from mental illnesses”
Rachel: ” I hope that my research will lead to new individualised treatments for mental illness that are based on the patient’s biology”
One in Five wants to find cures and make mental health better.
Visit the website to join their vital cause. www.oneinfive.com.au
Read more stories about Mental Health on Thrive50plus
