WASHINGTON - The National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) has released a report on the state of the nation's mental health care system and it is not good news for nine states that have been awarded "F." However, these states were only marginally worse when compared with the national average of "D."
NAMI ranked 48 states along with the District of Columbia and most states fared poorly in what President Bush has termed "a system in shambles." New York and Colorado did not respond with the information that was requested by NAMI. These new results are a cause for concern especially since mental illnesses are reputed to cause more disability in America than any other condition.
Indiana was rated as D minus and state officials concede that they were lucky to get off easily. Mitch Roob, the secretary of the Family and Social Services Administration at Indiana said so in a statement, "In some ways, I am surprised we scored even this well." Massachusetts rated C minus, but the alliance in charge here felt that it was nothing much to write home about, "We should be held to a higher standard. A C- is nothing to be proud of," said Toby Fisher, executive director at Massachusetts' chapter. "If you look at receiving mental health benefits as opposed to health benefits, it's substantially more difficult." Illinois has received the "F" grade and officials there are not amused since they feel that the state has one of the better systems in country, "We are making progress after decades of mismanagement, and we know what we need to move forward," said Keith Kemp, legislative director of NAMI here.
Tony Zipple, the Thresholds chief executive officer claimed that there were inherent problems in the state's system, "There are deeply embedded difficulties in Illinois' mental health system, and not the kind of focus on addressing them we would hope for," he said.
For more information and state-by-state results, visit www.nami.org/grad
