Mental Ill Health

AS WE report today, there is increasing evidence of widespread failings in provision of mental health services in the capital. The Sainsbury Centre for Mental Health states that two-thirds of emergency psychiatric beds in London are allocated to more than one patient at a time.

One in five psychiatric nursing posts are unfilled, and there are shortages of lead consultants and other hospital staff. The Healthcare Commission, meanwhile, has found disturbing levels of violence on mental health wards.

Other problems, such as the apparent inability to prevent illicit drugs and alcohol reaching patients, are failures of management. But there is also an overall shortfall between the facilities available and the scale of need.

Twice as many mental health patients in the capital have to be held in secure units as elsewhere, and provision here should reflect that. Instead, there are signs everywhere in London of extreme strain in mental health care. The South West London and St George’s Mental Health Trust has a deficit of Pounds 8 million and faces cuts, while SaneLine, the only national out-of-hours helpline for the mentally ill and their families, is having to shut its London centre. All the indications are that, after years in which “care in the community” policy led to the closure of many psychiatric hospitals, the extra Pounds 1 billion the Government has spent on mental health since 1999 has gone on bureaucracy and IT rather than providing enough secure beds. Though numbers of psychiatric staff have increased nationwide, there is, as in so many public services, a “London problem”. It is time for a complete rethink of the scale of provision for the severely mentally ill in the capital.