Our Health Policy Matters

At least thirty-six states increased funding for mental health services during 2013, according to a recent report by the National Alliance on Mental Illness .  And last week, Vice President Biden announced that the federal government was adding $100 million in new funding for mental health services. So have we turned the corner on our nation’s mental health funding crisis, as many of the accompanying news headlines seemed to imply?  Or are these initiatives more a token gesture aimed at mollifying the mental health advocacy community in the aftermath of the Sandy Hook massacre, as others have suggested ?  I think that – with a couple of notable exceptions in Connecticut and Texas – the initiatives tend more toward tokenism than real change. Consider the national initiative.  On the face of it, $100 million sounds like a lot of money.  But it still represents only around 3 percent of the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (S...

At least thirty-six states increased funding for mental health services during 2013, according to a recent report by the National Alliance on Mental Illness .  And last week, Vice President Biden announced that the federal government was adding $100 million in new funding for mental health services. So have we turned the corner on our nation’s mental health funding crisis, as many of the accompanying news headlines seemed to imply?  Or are these initiatives more a token gesture aimed at mollifying the mental health advocacy community in the aftermath of the Sandy Hook massacre, as others have suggested ?  I think that – with a couple of notable exceptions in Connecticut and Texas – the initiatives tend more toward tokenism than real change. Consider the national initiative.  On the face of it, $100 million sounds like a lot of money.  But it still represents only around 3 percent of the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (S...

Obesity rates in America are higher than ever. This is the conclusion in a new Robert Wood Johnson Foundation report entitled F as in Fat: How Obesity Threatens America’s Future .    Released last week, the document notes that one-third of children and two-thirds of adults are now obese or overweight.   Obesity is no minor health matter.   It is linked to disease, disability, and premature death. The report received some media attention for a couple of days, but then we had our fill of it.   It faded into the news background largely because we’ve heard the story before.   No one disputes the two major causes of obesity in America.   Americans take in too many calories, and work off too few. If we accept these causes at face value, the story ends as we decide that weight is a matter of individual – not governmental – responsibility.   The individual choice argument is a powerful one for those who do not think that the government needs to “int...

Obesity rates in America are higher than ever. This is the conclusion in a new Robert Wood Johnson Foundation report entitled F as in Fat: How Obesity Threatens America’s Future .    Released last week, the document notes that one-third of children and two-thirds of adults are now obese or overweight.   Obesity is no minor health matter.   It is linked to disease, disability, and premature death. The report received some media attention for a couple of days, but then we had our fill of it.   It faded into the news background largely because we’ve heard the story before.   No one disputes the two major causes of obesity in America.   Americans take in too many calories, and work off too few. If we accept these causes at face value, the story ends as we decide that weight is a matter of individual – not governmental – responsibility.   The individual choice argument is a powerful one for those who do not think that the government needs to “int...