Written by Megan 2D

Children’s charities are saying that there is a lack of mental health provision.  This urgently needs to change; to be revolutionised. Around half of all mental health problems occur before the age of 15, thus the mental health provision has a long way to go to tackle this issue early on in young peoples’ lives.

A shortage of mental health workers and psychologists is the result of budget cuts. Around a fifth of all children that are referred to NHS Scotland because of mental health aren’t seen within a target of 18 weeks. Between January 2015 and September 2016, over 30,000 young people have been seen by NHS Scotland mental health counselling services (‘Chams’), with almost 7,000 of those patients having been on a waiting list for more than 18 weeks. 708 of those had to wait more than a year; this insufficient service from the NHS needs radical improvements made to create the transformation that our country needs.

The Mental Health Minister, Maureen Watt has told BBC Scotland that “I have said that where there are long waiting times in health boards for ‘Chams’ and psychological therapies, it is not acceptable. I have used part of the £150m to make sure that those health boards that are far away from meeting targets are given help to, where necessary, redesign their whole service are where they need more people, more psychologists more nurses that those are provided.” They say that we are going to begin to see improvements, but it is a long way to go.