Latest News on the Murphy Bill

June, 2015
 
 
Urgent
 
 
VERY IMPORTANT:

On June 4th, 2015, Representative Tim Murphy of Pennsylvania re-introduced the Helping Families in Mental Health Crisis Act, also known as H.R. 2646. The National Coalition for Mental Health Recovery opposes this bill because it includes many harmful provisions that will set back community mental health care and undermine much of what our movement has worked so hard to achieve.
 
H.R. 2646, will:
  • Increase the use of forced treatment and hospitalization at the expense of voluntary, pro-active, community mental health services and supports.
  • Divert millions of Medicaid dollars from community services and supports to increase hospitalization.
  • Deny mental health block grants to states without involuntary outpatient commitment laws.
  • Prescribe the qualifications for certified peer support specialists in law, an unprecedented step that will ossify our discipline.
  • Eliminate the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. SAMHSA has promoted and funded major innovations such as peer support, recovery, wellness, trauma-informed care, state consumer and family networks and Alternatives.
  • Drastically cut grants that fund critical mental health services, substance abuse prevention and substance abuse treatment across the Nation.
  • Eliminate many innovative mental health services grants, put doctors in control of grant review and exclude knowledgeable people with lived experience from grant review and oversight.
  • Give Congress unprecedented control over all competitive grant awards.
  • Amend HIPAA to erode privacy rights for people with a mental health diagnosis; what is needed instead is better education on how HIPAA works.
  • Eliminate all protection and advocacy agency programs that protect our civil rights in housing, employment, education and other areas.
 
Please tell your member of Congress that you oppose H.R. 2646 (include your most important reason) and ask them not to support this bill.
 
 

 
View a video of a Hearing on the Murphy Bill held on June 16, 2015 titled "Examining HR-2646, the Helping Families in Mental Health Crisis"
 
 
The National Coalition for Mental Health Recovery (NCMHR) works to ensure that consumer/survivors have a major voice in the development and implementation of health care, mental health, and social policies at the state and national levels, empowering people to recover and lead a full life in the community.
 
 
National Coalition for Mental Health Recovery
Tel: 877-246-9058
E-mail: info@ncmhr.org
www.ncmhr.org