EDITORIAL: Mental health: Plan for crisis care deserves support
Free PressMay 15, 2022
May 15—A proposal by GOP Sen.
The bill (SF 3249) is aimed providing grants to hospitals, health-care providers or nonprofits to develop the urgency rooms as an alternative to housing young people under 25 with mental health problems in hospital emergency rooms. An in-depth
Draheim said he has been passionate about mental health as his father was a counselor and had a niece who took her own life, according to a report in MinnPost. The urgency room idea came from
The proposal aims to eliminate those long emergency room waits. The bill passed the
The bill would require medical providers who get the grants be able to house patients for 72 hours and provide various mental health screenings and evaluations.
Even if this is a small start on addressing the huge mental health crisis facing the state and nation, it deserves legislative approval.
Draheim says the bill has wide bipartisan support and is urging
"Hopefully, we can get it through and get some things started, and then we can expand on them in future sessions. It's very bipartisan. There are a lot of things that the governor likes in it. I'm trying to rally the other side of the aisle, that this is something that we can come together on and get done that will help people when we put politics aside and try to do the right thing," Draheim told MinnPost.
And mental health cases since the onset of the pandemic have only been rising. A
Draheim's bill will serve a critical need of getting those under 25 suffering from a mental health crisis time to get care.
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