NAMI News

At a briefing today hosted by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., Laurie Flynn, executive director of the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill (NAMI) outlined the most important factors for change in health care for the next decade and discussed key trends in the area of mental health care.

New Mexico today became the first state in 2000, and the 29th overall, to enact into law legislation aimed at ending unfair discrimination and providing more equitable coverage for mental illness in health insurance plans.

The National Alliance for the Mentally Ill (NAMI) is saddened and concerned by the police shooting death last week of William Anthony Miller, Jr., age 42, who suffered from mental illness.

The National Alliance for the Mentally Ill (NAMI) yesterday launched "I Vote, I Count 2000," a national non-partisan campaign for voter registration and education targeted to people with severe mental illness, their families and friends-with a goal of building a broad, aggressive movement for fundamental change in America's mental healthcare system.

The National Alliance for the Mentally Ill (NAMI) today praised the Charlotte Observer of Charlotte, North Carolina, for exposing an appalling pattern of neglect, abuse, and unreported deaths in North Carolina mental health facilities, which has set off a firestorm of reaction among state lawmakers and advocates.

On February 8, the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health, Human Resources, Education & Related Agencies will hold a hearing on suicide prevention that will include testimony from best-selling author Danielle Steel and Professor Kay Redfield Jamison, author of several academic and popular books on mental illness.

The National Alliance for the Mentally Ill (NAMI) will hold its annual legislative conference on February 5-8, 2000, at the Arlington Hilton Hotel, 950 North Stafford Street, Arlington, VA (703-528-6000). Approximately 200 NAMI leaders from throughout the United States will attend.

The National Alliance for the Mentally Ill expressed disappointment and concern over news from New Hampshire that Senator John McCain (R-AZ) apparently stands alone among presidential candidates in opposing a federal mandate that health insurance plans provide the same coverage for brain disorders as they provide for other disorders.

Larry Robison is scheduled to be executed on Friday, January 21st. A few days later, Iowa will cast the first votes in this year's presidential election.

We commend Dr. David Satcher, the Surgeon General, for his Call to Action to Prevent Suicide, published last year, along with his recent Report on Mental Health—the first in the nation’s history.