Lawsuit Threatens Connecticut’s KidCare Initiative, Three Other States Address Mental Health Services in Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report Round Up
Connecticut's mental health system for children faces federal monitoring while Montana, New Hampshire and New Mexico consider initiatives to improve behavioral health services in today's round up.
- Advocates representing Connecticut's abused and neglected children have "threatened" the state's Community KidCare plan, a "sweeping" initiative to improve community-based mental health services for children, suing to "place the program under control of a federal court monitor," state officials said. Under the lawsuit, officials from the Hartford-based Center for Children's Advocacy and New York-based Children's Rights Inc. have asked a judge to "hold the state in contempt of court if it isn't done." However, state officials maintain that the move would "severely restrict" the program and "possibly deny services" to thousands of children. A U.S. district judge will likely hear the case in Bridgeport, Conn., on Wednesday (Poitras, Hartford Courant, 6/3);
- Montana mental health providers joined Gov. Judy Martz (R) last week to promote a new law that state officials maintain will "improve services for children with the most severe emotional problems." Under the legislation (SB 454), which took effect in April, state agencies must "work more closely" with mental health care providers to ensure that children "get help at an early age" and receive the "appropriate, least costly" treatment for their problems (Anez, AP/Billings Gazette, 5/30);
- A New Hampshire state House panel is considering a bill that would appropriate $2 million for at least five "secure residential treatment centers" for "dangerous" mentally retarded residents -- many accused of crimes but not imprisoned "because of their mental disabilities." Although the state seven years ago established a program to "lock up" and provide treatment for mentally retarded residents "considered sexual or physical threats" to the community, lawmakers have "never dedicated money for it." The bill recently passed in the state Senate (Ayotte, AP/Nashua Telegraph, 5/23);
- Hoping to provide treatment for mentally ill residents, 13 New Mexico communities have begun participating in the University of New Mexico's UNM Cares program to "get more health care" to underserved people. According to Dr. R. Philip Eaton, UNM's vice president for health sciences, the university has headed the effort to "bring together all the players involved" in mental health treatment to "set a direction and goals for making care available" to uninsured and low-income state residents. The state Department of Health has also joined forces with other agencies and private health care systems to "assess mental health needs" and the "ability to meet those needs," state Health Secretary Alex Valdez said (Jadrnak, Albuquerque Journal, 5/29).
