The Mental Health Crisis in the Black Community

Less than two months ago Jovan Belcher, formerly of the Kansas City Chiefs shoots and kills his wife in their home. This occurred shortly before he drives himself to Arrowhead Stadium to kill himself. Through tragedy this distressing event has opened up dialogue among the public about the mental health crisis that seems to plague blacks in America at alarming disproportionate numbers when compared to other members of society.

Blacks make up 12 percent of the nations population, but account for roughly 25 percent of all mental health needs. Research done by Marc Lamont Hill shows that black suicide rates have climbed over 200 percent among black males in the past 30 years, and the depression rate is 50 percent higher for black women when compared to white counterparts. These alarming statistics show no sign of diminishing due to internal struggles among the black community in America.

With many of “us” lacking adequate health insurance, sufficient health facilities, and the fear of going to the doctor those reasons are three of many on why this mental health crisis is starting to become an epidemic amongst our people.

Even though we don’t have many academic accepted studies showing the parallel connection between social misery and mental health amongst our people it would be ludicrous not to see the correlation. When 50 percent of the correctional inmates look like me and I can see myself in the 40 percent of the homeless people outside you can see the relationship between social misery and the black mental crisis. The homelessness and prison demographic not only plague a portion of the black population, but it also isolates them from having access to the adequate mental health services that they will need for treatment. Those two examples may seem like extreme paradigms, but look at the amount of poverty, violence, and single parent households that our children are being exposed to at earlier ages. 25% percent of black youth according Loop 21 are exposed to enough violence to medically qualify them to meet diagnostic criteria for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder that are contemporarily associated with soldiers returning home from war.

As stated previously a margin of blacks (25%) are without health insurance in a nation where 16% are without. Many of those who are with insurance due to economical circumstances are the ones mainly accounted for those in the mental health crisis among the black community. According to Dr. Carl Bell (president & CEO of the Community Health Council) the problem isn’t the lack of quality health care professionals, but the access of mental health research amongst poor communities. The politics of the health care profession is becoming a detriment to our people.

Funding for research dealing with schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, depression, drug and substance abuse, and other mental illnesses amongst black people are not being researched because the incentive for a large payout isn’t there. So consequently the devotion for understanding these cultural and social issues is being completely ignored. Only 1 out of 3 blacks are getting proper treatment when needed. Many of blacks first access to mental health services are accessed subsequently why they are in correctional facilities. This issue goes back to research done in the 60’s before this current spike of black prison population, where race was eliminated from medical literature. During the 60’s only middle income and upper class individuals benefited from studies that were being funded for research on mental health, which left a large section of the population out of the medical research context. By doing this it further promoted institutionalized racial medical access discrimination amongst many of us. It wasn’t until 40 years later that former Surgeon General Dr. David Satcher released Culture, Race and Ethnicity Culture, Race and Ethnicity: A Supplement to Mental Health; which outlined problems amongst different groups. Still even after just this one piece of publication many questions still are unanswered and many problems still exist. Many blacks are given the run around when it comes to treatment due to lack of insurance coverage and government issued coverage. From lack of modern equipment to just simply going to the wrong places, or the notion of “putting it in God’s hands," many are put at a handicap.

Many people, especially those who deal with depression will simply go to pastors just so they can pray about it. Depending on your beliefs many folks will believe the notion that prayer changes, instead of God will make a way if you put in the work. Too many blacks use faith as a crutch instead of as tool for courage to fight through. It’s always good to pray, but we must still go to mental health specialist instead of just a general practitioner. When incidents most notably as the Tuskegee experiment and the lack of modern care, it’s expected for blacks to be reluctant to visit health care facilities, but we still have to encourage each other to get help.

Even though research has been limited, I feel as though we need to work on concentrating more on prevention to slow down the rising epidemic that the community is facing yearly. With bills of health care reform being passed which now includes access to more mental health care centers in poverty stricken areas, it will help some, but as a nation we still need to change the culture insensitivity that our nation has amongst this issue.