NAMI News

Today's action by the Senate Committee on Health, Employment, Labor & Pensions (HELP), recommending S.543, the Mental Health Equitable Treatment Act of 2001 unanimously to the full Senate represents an important step forward to strengthen existing law and end discrimination in insurance coverage.

Under S.543, discrimination against mental illnesses like postpartum depression would be prohibited. Introduced by U.S. Senators Pete Domenici (R-NM), Ted Kennedy (D-MA) and Paul Wellstone (D-MN) to strengthen existing federal law, the bill faces an October 1, 2001 deadline when current law expires.

NAMI strongly advocates for the passing of parity laws to end discriminatory health insurance coverage for children and adults with severe mental illnesses and their families. Such legislation will strengthen current federal law and finish the work that Congress began five years ago with the Mental Health Parity Act of 1996.

Delegates to the national convention of the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill (NAMI) in Washington, D.C. on July 11-15, 2001 elected four new members to the organization's board of directors, along with two incumbents, to three-year terms.

The National Alliance for the Mentally Ill (NAMI), the nation's largest grassroots organization dedicated to improving the lives of people with severe mental illnesses, will hold its 22nd annual convention July 11-14, 2001 at the Washington Hilton & Towers Hotel, 1919 Connecticut Avenue, Washington, D.C.

Approximately 2500 NAMI leaders will address scientific research, access to treatment, and other policy issues affecting both children and adults. More than 20 nations will be represented.

Each year, the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill (NAMI) honors reporters, editors and producers who have made a difference-covering stories or issues with exceptional accuracy, insight, balance, and sensitivity, and helping to challenge discrimination, or build public support for reforms that can improve the lives of people with mental illness.

Each year, NAMI presents awards to news reporters, editors and producers who have covered stories or issues about mental illness with exceptional accuracy, balance, insight, and sensitivity. 

The National Alliance for the Mentally Ill (NAMI), the nation's largest organization dedicated to improving the lives of people with mental illness, is honoring actors Maurice Benard, Sally Field, Carrie Fisher, and Samuel Jackson for facing the challenge of mental illness. Two have played characters with mental illness. The other two have lived it.

In the upcoming issue of Administration & Policy in Mental Health, researchers will publish significant findings that integrated treatment models, which include supported employment assistance, are effective in helping even those people with severe mental illnesses who initially have little or no interest in reentering the job market.