(Mental) Health Care Reform?

Health care reform has been a hot-button issue of Obama's presidency. Some right-wingers are terrified of becoming a bunch of socialists. Others just want to be able to afford the medication they need to live a healthful, comfortable life. Forty percent of the American population suffers from health problems relateing to unhealthy behaviors--smoking, lack of exercise, poor eating habits, etc. However, that 40% of the population accounts for at least 75% of health care costs. That means the majority of goverment money alotted for health care is spent on diseases and illness caused by people's CHOSEN behaviors.

But what about those people that didn't have a choice--a choice to have decreased serotonin levels causing depression, or a smaller hippocampus, making them susceptible to PTSD? About one-quarter of the U.S. population suffers from a diagnosable mental disorder each year. That's 58 million people. And according to the World Health Organization the "disease burden" of mental illness--quanitfying years spent suffering and years of life lost--is more severe than all cancers combined.

But treatment for mental health disorders is not always covered by insurance. Especially not the most basic insurance packages provided to those with a lower incomes. Mental health disorders are not just that--mental--they drastically effect a person's physically well-being as well. Sufferers of major depression often have chronic pain. And on average, people who have mental illness die 25 years earlier than those without. Though mental illness is ravaging the population it is a silent killer. It is only the past 20 years that we have come to realize that a mental disorder is a delicate interplay of mind and body. If one cannot be separated from the other, perhaps treatment shouldn't be either. If mental health treatment and primary care were to be integrated under the new health care reform bill, the full gamut of issues faced by sufferers of mental illness could be addressed with better patient results and lower costs.