Information: The newly-forged 1990-page “Affordable Health Care for America Act” (HR 3962) offered by the House of Representatives is filled with mental health provisions intended to prop up psychiatry as well as the pharmaceutical industry with billions in future income. Key mental health components of this House bill:

MOTHERS Act
The bill includes the language of the MOTHERS Act, to “expand treatment for postpartum conditions” and calls for the development of “improved screening and diagnostic techniques,” but makes no provisions to ensure any entities doing such research are free from conflicts of interest or pharmaceutical funding.  For example, Screening for Mental Health, Inc., and its sub-organization Signs of Suicide, who heavily promote and conduct mental health screening, received $4,985,925 from pharmaceutical companies prior to 2008, and ten leading psychiatric researchers have been exposed in the last year for failing to disclose millions of dollars in pharmaceutical payments.  Despite their conflicts of interest and biased research, many pharma funded psychiatrists and researchers have been used by so-called advocacy groups (Screening for Mental Health, NAMI, etc which are also heavily funded by Pharma) to promote the need for federal laws that will only increase the number of Americans being needlessly targeted for psychiatric treatment and drugged. Yet this bill contains no provisions for full disclosure of conflicts of interest for any “entity” that could receive federal taxpayer funded grants, do research or promotional campaigns – such as the provision in the bill calling for a national PR campaign using TV, radio public and other public service announcements to urge women be screened and seek treatment for postpartum depression.  The bill also calls for “clinical research” for the development of new treatments (drugs), but again, no guidelines for ensuring that any researchers/research entities are free from pharmaceutical funding or conflicts of interest. Section 2529, Page 1418

Mental Health Parity
The bill mandates Mental Health Parity, or equal insurance coverage for mental disorders as what are covered for physical diseases, whether under their regular health insurance or whether a person gets their new coverage through the Health Insurance Exchange.  Psychiatric patients are traditionally “cured” when their insurance benefits run out.  In this bill, those benefits never run out.  Considering there are no medical tests to verify the existence of any psychiatric disorder, and without anything other than a psychiatrist’s opinion about whether or not the person’s “illness” is “cured,” this legislation becomes nothing more than taxpayer funded billions to the psycho/pharmaceutical industry who will continue their jihad of mass drugging of Americans.  This provision could easily encompass all 374 diagnoses in psychiatry’s diagnostic manual, covering everything from Phase of Life Problem to Arithmetic Disorder.  Section 214, Page 100

Home Visitation Programs for Families with Young Children or Families Expecting Children
The bill creates a home visitation program for families with young children or which are expecting children or who have certain “risk factors.”  The program provides assessments regarding matters of “age appropriate behaviors,” for children, prevention of family violence and referral to outside services.  – Section 1904, Page 1177

School Based Health Clinics
The bill includes funding for School Based Health Clinics that will include subjective psychiatric mental health screening (called mental health assessments) of children, and “referral to a continuum of services including emergency psychiatric care, community support programs, inpatient care, and outpatient programs” as part of their “comprehensive primary health services.”  This is a direct feeder line for the psycho/pharmaceutical industry directly into our schools. – Section 2511, Page 1352

Wellness Program Grants for small employers
The grants in the bill serve as an incentive for employers to include “mental health” as part of the Wellness Program Grants to businesses.  Part of the program entails a “Behavioral Change Component” that encourages “healthy living through counseling” and may include programs relating to “tobacco use, obesity, stress management, depression and mental health.” – Section 112, Page 67

Federally Qualified Behavioral Health Centers
The bill creates new “Federally Qualified Behavioral Health Centers” and in order for existing community mental health centers to qualify, they have to provide, among other things, “mental health screening, assessment, and diagnosis,” as well as “outpatient clinic mental health services, including screening, assessment, diagnosis, psychotherapy and medication,” in addition to “crisis mental health services including 24-hour mobile crisis teams.”  – Section 2513, Page 1367

Your voice needs to be heard in Washington on this outrageous bill. Call, fax, or email your Representative and tell them that you are opposed to the above points in the Health Care Reform bill. To find your Representative and get their contact information, go to http://www.congress.org/congressorg/directory/congdir.tt to look them up (you need to enter your zip code). You can also call the U.S. Capitol Switchboard at (202) 224-3121.