Decriminalising being Black with mental illness

Abstract

Mental illness should not be a death sentence. Being Black should not be a death sentence. Yet, in 2020 alone we have witnessed how these intersecting identities—Blackness and having a mental illness—have disproportionately led to the murder of Black people by police officers in the USA. 1 Manke K Stark racial bias revealed in police killings of older, mentally ill, unarmed Black men. https://news.berkeley.edu/2020/10/05/stark-racial-bias-revealed-in-police-killings-of-older-mentally-ill-unarmed-black-men/Date: Oct 5, 2020 Date accessed: October 28, 2020 Google Scholar The deaths of George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery, Rayshard Brooks, and Breonna Taylor focused international attention on excessive force used by police. These deaths sparked global protests, centring the Black Lives Matter movement and drawing attention to the grim reality that in the USA Black people are at an increased risk of death at the hands of the police. 1 Manke K Stark racial bias revealed in police killings of older, mentally ill, unarmed Black men. https://news.berkeley.edu/2020/10/05/stark-racial-bias-revealed-in-police-killings-of-older-mentally-ill-unarmed-black-men/Date: Oct 5, 2020 Date accessed: October 28, 2020 Google Scholar The Washington Post database shows that Black people are killed by police at more than twice the rate of White people, despite constituting only 13% of the US population. 2 The Washington PostFatal Force. https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/investigations/police-shootings-database/Date: Oct 28, 2020 Date accessed: October 28, 2020 Google Scholar Frontline 2020: the new age for telemental healthTelemental health care has been widely available for several decades and encompasses the remote delivery of psychiatric and psychological services.1 Telemental health care has been found to be effective in assessing and diagnosing mental health conditions across the lifespan and ethnic groups.2 Benefits of telemental health include the engagement of friends or family and the wider professional network in consultations; savings in the time required to deliver health care;3 and the reach to populations that might not be able to access mental health services owing to lack of, or insufficient service provision or high care costs. Full-Text PDF What has happened to children's wellbeing in the UK?“Modern life has been chipping away at children's happiness over time”; this statement was the pessimistic conclusion of The Good Childhood Report 2020,1 which focused on wellbeing in children between the ages of 10 and 15 years across the UK. The report emphasised that children in the UK, especially girls, are among the most unhappy and least satisfied in Europe. The UK ranked lowest of 24 European countries in its proportion of children aged 15 years with high life satisfaction, lowest in its proportion with a positive sense of purpose in life, and second highest in its proportion with high sadness levels. Full-Text PDF Perspectives of lived experience across continents: our reality and call for universal health coverageThe Global Action Plan,1 signed by major global health agencies, provides a framework that guides collective action towards universal health coverage (UHC) and accelerates progress on the health-related Sustainable Development Goals.2 However, according to WHO, the world remains a long way from meeting its 2030 targets. Additionally, the COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted how fragile our health systems are in the provision of quality and holistic care. The Global Mental Health Peer Network (GMHPN) aims to highlight the lived experiences of people in various world regions, showcasing that if true recovery is to be achieved, UHC must include the most vulnerable individuals among us and the uniqueness of diverse lived experiences. Full-Text PDF COVID-19 offers an opportunity to reform mental health in IndiaThe pre-COVID-19 scenario for mental health in India was grim. One in seven Indians had mental disorders of varying severity in 2017,1 and Indians accounted for 26·6% of the global suicide deaths in 2016.2 The proportional contribution of mental disorders to the total disease burden in India is estimated to have almost doubled between 1990 and 2017,1 and 5·1% of the adult population is estimated to have some level of suicidality.3 Like elsewhere, the variety and extent of the implications of the COVID-19 pandemic for mental health are yet to be fully understood in India. Full-Text PDF