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Serial killer Anthony Hardy suffered mental health problems years before he killed |
Mental health problems have an affect on all of us
We have to increase public understanding of mental health problems writes David Taylor
ONE in every twenty murders in England and Wales is committed by a person with a mental health problem.’ This recent shock statistic, highlighted last week by government’s mental health tsar Louis Appleby, demands critical attention. It implies a total of some 50 deaths a year. Some were almost certainly preventable.
In comparison the 100,000 or so deaths caused by smoking every year, or the 5,000 people who take their own lives through suicide, this figure may seem relatively small. But complacency is no comfort to the relatives of anyone who dies in such circumstances. It is little wonder there is public concern.
It is also an obvious fact that public service providers of all types, from GPs to hospital staff, police and social workers, should do all they can to reduce the risk of such tragedies occurring. Smoking in the main kills only those who elect to smoke. The fear of being attacked by ‘a maniac’ is that such risks are unpredictable, and might seemingly strike anyone.
However, there is at least an element of reassurance in the fact while the overall number of murders in this country has doubled since the 1960s there has been no corresponding growth in the number of killings linked to mental health problems.
It is also of note that in the days of the giant asylums which characterised mental health care before the modern era, more may have died as a result of such attacks. This is despite the fact over a 100,000 more individuals were confined within the often forbidding walls of the old mental hospitals than are resident in inpatient mental health facilities today.
Seen from this perspective the move towards less custodial patterns of mental health care that has taken place since the 1950s has brought important benefits. Mental health problems affect all of us. The development of better forms of treatment and support has enabled literally millions of people to live more fully, and to reduce needless fear, prejudice and lost personal opportunity.
The World Health Organistion (WHO) recently commented that NHS and local government mental health and social care services in England are already the best in Europe. It is perhaps a very British weakness that we often fail to recognise this success. In Camden and Islington we have both committed community teams and caring hospital based providers. We are fortunate to have good facilities such as the Highgate Mental Health Centre.
Yet there is still a long way to go before mental health services here in our boroughs and elsewhere in the country will universally reach a standard with which we should be satisfied. Complacency is also unlikely to be of comfort to those individuals and families hit by mental illness.
The solutions to present problems lie not only in investing enough money in voluntary and public services, but also in increasing public understanding of the nature of mental illness and the ways the harm it causes can be minimised. In some cases the new compulsory mental illness treatment provisions the government is presently urging Parliament to accept may help reduce the risk of tragedies like murders and suicides occurring.
Louis Appleby’s alarming murder figures may have been politically aimed at facilitating this reform process. However, hundreds of thousands more people are likely to benefit from the removal of exaggerated fears about mental illness, and the building of greater respect for mental health service users.
There is no magic way of achieving such progress. Just as irrational fears about physical conditions like cancer have been reduced as treatments improve and its causes become widely understood, so the same is like to be true for mind illnesses such as schizophrenia. To the extent that breaking down the psychological walls that still surround mental illness is part of the way forward, wider involvement of the public in decision making about mental health service provision would be beneficial. For one thing could help more of us to accept people with mental health problems, and avoid falling into the trap of victim blaming.
Currently, the Camden and Islington Mental Health and Social Care Trust is consulting on how it should seek Foundation Trust status. Many of the advantages of this are linked to financial mechanisms and internal governance issues. But another positive aspect of such a change is that any resident of Camden and Islington will be able to become a member of the new Foundation Trust.
Trust members can elect the organisation’s local governors, and more directly influence future policies.
I hope that, assuming the Care Trust’s application proceeds, many readers will choose to join, and actively take a part in representing public interests in mental health improvement and public health protection. Without such voluntary involvement no community is likely to be truly healthy.
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