Sunday night, during the Democratic presidential primary debate, independent Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders declared that as president, he would invest more money into mental health. "And when you watch these Republican debates," he added, "you know why we need to invest in mental health." The audience roared with laughter. So did former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
That's one of the problems with mental health care today: the stigma that still surrounds mental illness. It includes making jokes about and trivializing what are serious medical conditions. Depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia and post-traumatic stress disorder, to name a few, are not laughing matters. The irony of Sanders' statement is that while promising to invest more money in mental health, he perpetuated the kind of public attitudes that historically have contributed to the inadequacy of the current system.
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