Church can't turn its back on the mentally ill
Paul Jensen - Eureka Street
On Monday 13 and Tuesday 14 April, ABC's Australian Story and The 7:30 Report ran stories that highlighted the nation's poor mental health system, resulting too often in people reaching crisis point and taking their own lives. The stories were very human accounts of the dislocation and disorientation wreaked by mental illness.
These stories foreshadowed the release of the National Mental Health Commission's Review of Mental Health Programs and Services, and the addition of mental health as an agenda item for the Council of Australian Governments (COAG). The review highlights waste in the mental health system, ambiguous reports and the inability to determine whether real and substantial change has occurred.