[Congressional Record Volume 159, Number 124 (Thursday, September 19, 2013)]
[House]
[Pages H5657-H5658]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                   DEALING WITH MENTAL HEALTH ISSUES

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
Pennsylvania (Mr. Murphy) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. MURPHY of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, this week America was once 
again shocked by the tragic shootings at the Navy Yard in Washington, 
D.C., and once again, it raised the issue of how we're handling mental 
health to stop this terrible violence.
  When you look at the background that was reported in the general 
media about Aaron Alexis, who is responsible for the shooting at the 
Navy Yard, we see a record of being arrested multiple times; receiving 
treatment at a veterans hospital; law enforcement officials in Rhode 
Island were called upon because he had been hearing voices in his head; 
he was worried and ``had sent three people to follow him to keep him 
awake by talking to him and sending

[[Page H5658]]

vibrations to his body''; he checked into multiple hotels to avoid the 
voices; he also had episodes of shooting firearms.
  Recently, there was also a case in Georgia where Michael Brandon Hill 
clutched a butcher knife over his parents' bed; attempted to set the 
home on fire; made deadly threats through social media; was bipolar, 
had attention disorder, was schizophrenic; told police he was off 
medication; had stolen a firearm; had 498 rounds of ammunition when he 
entered a school. Luckily, no one was harmed.
  What America has done in dealing with people with mental illness is 
so far short of what we should be doing, it's not surprising we are 
still failing the system. America has replaced its psychiatric 
hospitals with prisons and bridges for homelessness. Pennsylvania some 
years ago had 20 psychiatric hospitals and 8 jails. Now we have 20 
jails and 8 psychiatric hospitals. One out of five men has mental 
illness, and one out of every two women in those jails has a mental 
illness.
  Why don't we use such things as considered background checks for 
those to obtain guns? In 2010, when 14 million attempts were made to 
purchase weapons, there were 72,000 denials because those folks had 
pinged positive because they had an arrest record or had an inpatient 
obligatory stay. Of those, 34,000 had felony conviction indictments and 
13,000 were fugitives. But there were only 44 prosecutions, and only a 
few of those were found guilty. Background checks don't even begin to 
deal with the millions of people who have a psychiatric illness and go 
untreated. There is a lack of inpatient and outpatient treatment 
options, and we need to finally begin dealing with these problems.
  What we need are several aspects, and in the next couple of weeks 
I'll be offering a package of legislation that finally works towards 
dealing with these so we do not continue to say our primary methods of 
treatment for Americans with mental illness are jails and homelessness.
  First, we need to recognize that we have a lack of inpatient 
treatment options. There were 500,000 psychiatric beds in 1955; now 
there are less than 40,000. What we need to do is increase the options 
that are available for people with inpatient and outpatient treatment.
  Two, we need to get serious on research for those with mental 
illness. NIMH has a paltry little over $1 billion in money it can spend 
on research, and very little of that is spent on those with serious 
mental illness. Indeed, most with mental illness are not violent, but 
when you see someone with a selective set of symptoms with serious 
mental illness, we know that they may be at a more increased risk, 
particularly those who have a history of delusion, paranoia, and 
interest in violence. What happens in general, from the time of onset 
of first symptoms, a person may wait an average of 110 weeks before 
they get into treatment.
  In addition, we need more research on medications. There are 11.4 
million American adults that suffer from serious mental illness, 
including schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and major depression, but 2 
million are not being treated. We need more effective research.
  Three, Federal laws, which are meant to protect confidentiality, such 
as HIPAA and FERPA, otherwise known as the Family Educational Rights 
and Privacy Act, have frustrated the efforts of physicians and family 
to share information. Many times doctors and other officials cannot get 
to the very people who can prevent problems and get the person in 
treatment. Colleges and high schools do not share information with 
parents because they're afraid of getting sued. Mental health 
professionals hold on to information, and they wish they could talk 
more with parents. We need to clarify these boundaries.
  Four, law enforcement officials need more training. Police officers 
are on the frontline of dealing with the violent mentally ill. They 
need to understand how to identify and handle mental health 
emergencies. In addition, the primary responders to these ought to be 
paramedics, those who are trained to deal with health issues. We need 
to remove the stigma. From the very beginning, we need to be dealing 
with this as a health issue.
  One thousand homicides a year are committed by those with serious 
mental illness. It's only 5 percent to 10 percent of homicides, but we 
need to make sure we have that help. We also need to make sure we have 
integrated care at community mental health centers. Unfortunately, 
there are barriers to billing with Medicare. We need incentives for 
pediatricians to get additional training. We need to review what SAMHSA 
does with its spending, and VA hospitals need to have more help.
  Overall, there are many areas that we can engage in, and we will 
continue to do this to make sure we effectively treat mental illness.

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