Mental Health Awareness Month Roundup 

May was Mental Health Awareness Month. CLASP’s mental health work centers on systems and policy change with an explicit focus on how race and ethnicity affect a person’s interactions with systems and services. We are working to reimagine how our national, state, and local mental and behavioral health systems could better serve people living in households with low incomes. The following resources offer insight into key data, strategies, and principles that reframe mental health.   

New Resources Released in May:   

• A Q&A with the HANA Center: White Supremacy’s Impact on AAPI Communities: CLASP spoke with Taneka Hye Wol Jennings of the HANA Center in Chicago to discuss how families and young people have been impacted by heightened xenophobia and attacks against the AAPI community. 
• On May 19th, Isha Weerasinghe participated on a virtual Congressional briefing on a new report from Trust for America’s Health and Well Being Trust, Pain in the Nation: Alcohol, Drug and Suicide Deaths. Isha highlighted CLASP’s Core Principles to Reframe Mental and Behavioral Health Policy and A New Deal for Youth. Watch a recording of the briefing here. 
• On May 19, Nia West-Bey joined partners from the Prevention Institute and the Research Triangle Institute at the 2021 DOD/VA Suicide Prevention Conference. Her presentation was titled “Updating CDC’s Technical Package for Suicide Prevention: New Evidence and Application for Use in Times of Infrastructure Disruption.”   
• On May 26th, the Changemakers from A New Deal for Youth publicly shared their Healing and Wellbeing vision and demands. Changemaker Joseph Yusuf spoke about the importance of Healing and Wellbeing in a panel discussion. Watch the full event here.  Read the full list of demands here.  
• On May 27, Isha Weerasinghe was a panelist in a virtual roundtable hosted by the National Asian American Pacific Islander Mental Health Association as part of a series held for Mental Health Awareness Month and Asian Pacific American Heritage Month. The panel was titled “Part 3: What’s Next? Community Action for Transformational Change.” You can watch the recording here. 

Other Important CLASP Mental Health Resources  

• #WhyWeCan’tWait: Youth Data Portrait – Healing and Wellbeing  
• Youth Mobile Response Services: An Investment to Decriminalize Mental Health  
• Core Principles to Reframe Mental and Behavioral Health Policy   
• Prioritize Young People’s Mental Health with a $7.5 Billion Investment