What projects does MHA plan to use the funds for?
Funds given to Mental Health America will go towards our programs, including screening individuals for mental health conditions and directing them to resources, advocating for policies that advance accessible mental healthcare for all, and developing free public education resources on mental health and mental illness. Learn more about MHA’s programs at mhanational.org/programs.
What have been some major milestones of MHA since its formation?
Since our founding in 1909, Mental Health America has been at the forefront of the mental health movement. Some of MHA’s major historical milestones include the creation of the National Institute of Mental Health after the passage of the National Mental Health Act in 1947, the founding of Mental Health Awareness Month in 1949, the inclusion of mandated mental health services in Medicare in 1966, the inclusion of individuals with mental health disabilities in the Americans with Disabilities Act in 1990, the passage of the Mental Health Parity Act in 2008, the inclusion of mental health as an essential health benefit in the Affordable Care Act in 2010 and the passage of the Helping Families in Mental Health Crisis Act as part of the 21st Century Cures Act in 2016.
In recent years, MHA launched its free, anonymous online screening program in 2014 (MHAScreening.org) and has successfully screened over 10 million individuals for mental health conditions and provided them with customized resources and information.
Learn more about our extensive history of accomplishments at mhanational.org/history.
What are MHA’s long-term goals and future missions?
As we look to the future, we are both grateful for the progress we have made in the past century and hopeful about the fights ahead of us. We want to keep moving the needle on where and when we address the mental health needs of all, because overwhelming data shows that early intervention and prevention helps people to recover quickly and with minimal disruption to their lives. We will continue to educate the public and our government officials on the importance of these issues, as we always have, and we will advocate for identifying and addressing mental health challenges across all settings, including schools, primary care offices, and more. We are also expanding our academic research partnerships to more deeply analyze our screening data.
