Motivated by the massacre of 20 elementary school children in Newtown, Conn., Florida lawmakers are grappling with shortcomings in how the state treats the mentally ill in the hope of averting similar disasters.
What state officials, providers and advocates told a House committee on Thursday was grim.
Nearly two-thirds of the state’s mentally ill go untreated. The lifespan of those with mental illnesses is 25 years shorter than those without psychiatric problems. And, adjusted for inflation and population, the state spends less now on mental health services than it did three decades ago.
The state is “facing a deepening crisis in our publicly-financed mental health system,” Florida Council for Community Mental Health President Bob Sharpe told the House Healthy Families Committee before unleashing those statistics.
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