World Mental Health Day - Are We Progressing?

Today, 10th October 2013, is World Mental Health Day, an annual occasion on which mental health, for this brief period, is forced, or should be forced, to the top of the agenda. So, in recognition of this auspicious day, I thought I'd just print a few thoughts on whether we are progressing in our goals of bettering the representation and treatment of those with experience of mental illness.
In terms of how mental illness is represented in the media, it would seem that any progress on that front has taken a blow with the recent Sun front-page headline, "1200 Killed by Mental Patients". Mental health campaigners have been enraged by such sensationalism. Once again, the link is made between mental ill health and violence, and, as I've often said in these pages, while one cannot deny that those with mental illness sometimes commit violent acts, it is an absurd misrepresentation to suggest that violence is some kind of symptom of mental ill health. Stories of recovery and achievement despite illness then remain extremely rare, while all too often accounts of violent acts committed by those with mental illness are the only ones which make the headlines. It must always be remembered that those rendered vulnerable through their ill health are much more likely to be the victims of violence than the perpetrators.
Which brings us to another recent story concerning the treatment of those with experience of mental illness, namely, that of Tom Orchard, a 32-year-old man with a diagnosis of schizophrenia who died after being taken into custody and restrained by police. In a related recent TV programme, it was shown that many with experience of mental ill health are increasingly finding themselves incarcerated in police cells rather than in the safer environs of hospital. In the case of Mr. Orchard, he was taken into custody after committing a public order offence, and was restrained with a type of belt, usually only used on the legs and arms, but according to news reports, also now used around the head. What actually happened in this case is yet to be understood, but Tom Orchard's family are insisting on seeing CCTV footage of the restraint, no matter how distressing this may be for them, in order that the truth can be known. So, conclusions are yet to be drawn, but one might venture that the treatment Mr. Orchard received at the hands of people supposedly there to protect the vulnerable was, at best, inhumane, at worst, criminal.
As this is World Mental Health Day, one should probably go further afield than one's own country in assessing how mental health is perceived and treated. On Channel 4 News last night, a segment of the programme was devoted to the treatment of mental illness in war-torn Somalia. As one might expect, rates of mental ill health in that country run higher than our 1 in 4 statistic, with over a third of their population experiencing some form of mental illness, no doubt due to the extreme trauma of war. Despite this, mental illness is still viewed by Somalis as extremely shameful, and the news segment concentrated on one man who had been chained by his leg to the ground by his own family for seventeen years due to his mental health problems. He lived in a makeshift hut and his only stimulus was listening to old Somali songs. Thankfully, the man was eventually released by his family to attend a hospital where he received medication, a shower and a haircut. Even in the hospital, though, some of the patients were wearing chains around both their ankles.
So, such things perhaps put our own worries about the state of the perception and treatment of mental illness into perspective. Having said that, all the stories above show how far we still have to go. On World Mental Health Day, then, maybe we can all make a collective resolution to improve the lot of those with experience of mental ill health. One would have hoped that more progress would have been made than is suggested by what's been written here, but with all our efforts, improvements can still take place.