News and Commentary from the

Treatment Advocacy Center

December 2020

Below is a summary of recent developments and compelling news stories from across the country highlighting America's broken mental health treatment system and how to fix it.

New Study Shows NIMH Fails People with Serious Mental Illness

Treatment Advocacy Center founder Dr. E. Fuller Torrey and Director of Research Elizabeth Hancq wrote a summary of the results from a new study that shows NIMH clinical research on serious mental illness fails people with serious mental illness by both national and international standards. Read more, here.

Treatment Advocacy Center Staff Testify Before Virginia Legislature

Treatment Advocacy Center’s Director of Advocacy Lisa Dailey and consultant Eric Smith testified Dec. 8 before the Virginia Senate Joint Subcommittee to Study Mental Health Services in the 21st Century: Involuntary Commitment/Emergency Services Workgroup. Dailey and Smith offered testimony in support of the draft legislation that improves Virginia’s mandatory outpatient treatment law to make it more usable for implementers and to work better for those enrolled. Read more, here.

Treatment Advocacy Center in the News

Individuals with mental Illness deserve treatment, not jail time

Treatment Advocacy Center's data on the prevalence of serious mental illness in jails and prisons was cited in an article about the Criminal Mental Health Project created by Miami-Dade County Judge Steve Leifman. The project aims to place people with mental illness in treatment instead of jail. Read more here.

Police are not equipped to properly handle crisis calls

The Treatment Advocacy Center's statistics on fatal law enforcement encounters were cited in an op-ed arguing that police should not be first-responders to crisis calls. Read more here.

RESEARCH WEEKLY: 2020 Recap

The Office of Research and Public Affairs (ORPA) have put together our list of top 10 research published this year about severe mental illness. The list includes commentary on our favorite published research from each of the ORPA team members who brought Research Weekly to your inbox every week throughout 2020. Much like looking forward to 2021 after the COVID-19 pandemic dominated much of our lives in 2020, this list focuses on the impact of the research findings for people with severe mental illness, their families and loved ones for the future.

Find the 2020 Top 10 List of Severe Mental Illness Research here.

To receive Research Weekly directly in your email inbox on a weekly basis, click here.

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