David Farrar: Mental Health targets

Mental health Minister Matt Doocey announced:

• Faster access to specialist mental health and addiction services: target of 80 percent of people accessing specialist mental health and addiction services are seen within three weeks

• Faster access to primary mental health and addiction services: target of 80 percent of people accessing primary mental health and addiction services through the Access and Choice programme* are seen within one week

• Shorter mental health and addiction-related stays in emergency departments: target of 95 percent of mental health and addiction-related emergency department presentations are admitted, discharged, or transferred from an emergency department within six hours

• Increased mental health and addiction workforce development: target of training 500 mental health and addiction professionals each year

• Strengthened focus on prevention and early intervention: target of 25 percent of mental health and addiction investment is allocated towards prevention and early intervention

Annoyingly it is hard to locate what the current data is, so it is hard to assess how much of an improvement achieving these will be. But again good to see a Government commit to improved outcomes and outputs.

David Farrar runs Curia Market Research, a specialist opinion polling and research agency, and the popular Kiwiblog where this article was sourced. He previously worked in the Parliament for eight years, serving two National Party Prime Ministers and three Opposition Leaders.