Guns are not prohibited in the United States. Most United States citizens with a license can easily purchase a gun in a shop or online.
It may be a crisis for someone with mental illness to buy a gun without any barrier. The most recent case of such an issue was the mass murder in Sandy Hook Elementary School. Adam Lanza killed 20 children and six adults on Dec. 14, 2012. After committing such atrocities, Lanza committed suicide.
Such infamous campus murders are not rare in the United States, considering the Virginia Tech massacre, the Northern Illinois University shooting, the Oikos University shooting and so on. Most cases are more or less related to mental diseases such as Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), depression or Autism.
Since the law does not currently prohibit guns, a better alternative may be to improve mental health care. Even if mental diseases are not related to violent cases, it is still the government's responsibility to provide high-quality mental health care to its citizens.
President Obama said we needed to make "access to mental health care at least as easy as access to guns" after the Newtown tragedy. President Obama's speech disclosed a cruel truth: the access to mental health care is still limited, especially for an advanced country like the U.S.
According to a 2008 nationwide survey by Harris Interactive, about 44 percent of United States citizens do not have mental coverage or are not sure if they do.
Obviously, the government has not recognized the significance of mental health care, which is equivalent to physical health. A man with a healthy body and unhealthy mentality is similar to a machine which although it still works, gets rusty internally. Maybe it will keep working in one or two years. But after 10 or 20 years, devastating consequences are inevitable. And with the damage of one machine, the whole factory will go bankrupt. The Newtown tragedy is an obvious case of this logic.
So what we should do first is recognize the importance of mental health and know the consequences of mental diseases.
It is necessary to correct the flawed idea that mental disease is not a disease, and patients don't need to see doctors. In order to take mental diseases seriously, the government should give more budgets to support mental health care services to improve the coverage for mental health care.
Besides, the government should monitor these services to make sure they are working. Currently, we are facing challenges in the measurement of the quality of mental health care.
Challenges include the lack of sufficient evidence, limited descriptions of mental health and the lack of electronic health information system to capture the required health information.
According to a recent study, only 12 percent of U.S. hospitals have electronic medical records. The government needs to solve these problems to improve the quality of mental health care.
A good idea is to integrate metal health care into primary care via health care reform, which means that when you have your routinely physical check-up, mental health should also be checked.
It's beneficial to find the mental problem in an early stage and to solve the problem as soon as possible.
However, it's quite hard to define some mental diseases at an early stage. The specificity and sensitivity to diagnose such diseases should be improved.
Although, early stages of mental disease is hard to diagnose by doctors, such integration is necessary.
At least, some people with severe mental disorders like PTSD can be diagnosed. Besides, some people with mental disease don't want to see the doctor because they cannot afford the expenditure.
The integration can cut the cost for mental disease and directly encourage patients go to doctor.
Education is another way to improve mental health. This kind of education is intended to teach people how to get rid of unhappiness caused by pressure and frustration.
Children should be educated by both schools and their parents or guardians. When a child grows up, physical health is very important.
However, mental stability is also integral.
Parents should be responsible for educating their children in the ways to keep mental health.
It is more effective for parents to educate their children. Meanwhile, a school must do more than just equip their students with knowledge of science or prepare them for the SAT or GRE.
It's time for the government to recognize the equivalent importance of mental health and physical health and to focus on improving U.S. citizen's mental health.
Zheng Li is a first-year Masters in Public Health student at the Rollins School of Public Health from Shanghai, China.
Cartoon by Katrina Worsham
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