Mental Health Solutions Alone Can't Thwart Gun Violence, Experts Say

[Neoma]

When it comes to preventing gun-related violence, President Barack Obama and the National Rifle Association agree on one key priority: Both call for measures aimed at preventing people with mental illnesses from owning firearms.
In the days after a lone gunman massacred 20 schoolchildren in Newtown, Conn., Obama called for an expansion of mental health services and more stringent background checks for gun buyers to screen out those who may pose a danger. The NRA proposed the creation of a national registry of people with mental illnesses to help limit their ability to purchase guns.
But public health and firearms experts assert that focusing on mental illness is unlikely to achieve a significant reduction in gun violence, because the vast majority of shootings are the handiwork of people who do not fit the profile of those deemed dangerous. Moreover, by shifting the debate away from gun control and toward mental health concerns, proponents run the risk of further stigmatizing mental illness, discouraging those who confront it from seeking professional help.

Read the rest.

[elleng]

1. Nothing 'alone' can thwart,

like no single approach will remedy broken education or medical or any other system.

[Neoma]

2. The stigma feels like it's higher than ever.

It reminds me of when in psychward this young man who was in there for the first time was saying, "no offense, but I'm not like you people." I took offense, oops.

But I think that's how people view the mentally ill. "You people." ...

[elleng]

3. Of course.

[HereSince1628]

4. ~half of the new mental health care money in the proposed federal budget is for educating

teachers to the signs of mental illness in children supporting an attempt to stem gun violence.

There have been a couple of newspaper articles about increased spending for mental illness in Obama's budget,

It seems that the new budget will include about 130 million additional dollars directed for mental health related spending, of which about 60 million will go to the education of teachers about recognizing mental illness in school children.

There are about 6 million elementary and secondary school teachers in the US, so that effort represents an investment of about $10 per teacher. That's surely better than nothing.

But considering the concept is to make teachers the front line detectors of early mental illness in children that seems minimal.

[Neoma]

5. Sometimes teachers are idiots when it comes to health problems.

Step-cousin of mine has juvenile diabetes and his teacher has type 2 diabetes and she somehow thinks it's the same thing.

But I'm glad it's going towards educating...