Ohio Grant Will Help Inmates with Mental Health Issues

Earlier this month, Ohio’s Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services (MHAS) announced $3 million in grants to help county jail inmates with mental health problems.

The MHAS grants will be used to provide inmates with mental health and addiction treatment, both while incarcerated and when they are released. Some recipients will also get training through the Stepping Up Initiative, a group aiming to “reduce the number of mentally ill people in jail” (Kim, 2015).

Tracy Plouck, director of MHAS, stated, “What we want to do is continue progress that we’ve made in the last two years by investing in partnerships between mental health and addiction services boards locally and their partnering county jail and sheriff’s office” (Kim, 2015).

According to addiction news website The Fix, “the rates of serious mental illness in jails are three to six times higher than in the general population, and nearly three-quarters of adult jail inmates with serious mental illness also have substance abuse disorders” (Kim, 2015). In addition, every year approximately two million people enter jail in the United States with serious mental illnesses.

References

Kim, V. (2015). Ohio grants $3 million in funding for mental health support in jails. Retrieved from https://www.thefix.com/ohio-grants-3-million-funding-mental-health-support-jails