Palm Beach Post (Florida)

March 3, 2021 Wednesday

FINAL EDITION

If ever there was a time to modernize how we treat mental health and substance use treatment; the height of a global pandemic certainly seems like such a time.

It is a near-constant refrain that most of us believe that something — anything — must be done to improve how we address the very serious mental health issues in our state.

Here is one simple, yet effective policy change that can directly help people and change how we address our failing mental health system.

When patients are diagnosed with a mental health condition, too often they find that insurance fails to cover, or inadequately covers, treatment for that condition. In Florida, we know that the insurance policies we allow can severely limit access to mental health treatment, and the resulting gaps in coverage have the effect of making treatment too expensive. Note, these are people with full health insurance coverage, yet even they cannot get the coverage they need.

This must change.

A well-conceived federal law that has been in place for over a decade — pre-dating the Affordable Care Act — is supposed to ensure that mental health or substance abuse disorders are treated just like other health care services. It’s called “mental health parity.” But in our state, health insurers can functionally ignore the law.

I have introduced a bill (House Bill 959) to close the coverage gap loophole and put our state in alignment with federal law. If my bill passes and is signed into law by the governor, insurance companies would not be able to discriminate against patients who need mental health or substance use disorder treatment.

This is vital because, by at least one estimate, nearly half of those with health care policies reported that their plans limited the number of visits to a mental health professional, while no such limits were placed on traditional medical or surgical visits. Over half of them also reported that they were mandated to go out of network to receive basic mental health services — most often, to pay much higher out-of-pocket costs. Perhaps the saddest statistic of all, three in 10 were forced to get repeated authorizations at each stage of treatment for the same diagnosis and treatment plan — a violation of law for something like arthritis or diabetes.

Though a simple change, it won’t be easy to enact. Many people — including many medical professionals — simply do not see these disorders as being on the same plane as a treatment for a disease like cancer. The insurance lobby will sow fear about rising costs and the unknown impacts of the law.

The good news is that as other states have come into compliance, we now have data showing that closing this loophole and offering patients early treatment for mental health and substance use-related disorders can and will save both lives and money.

With a growing mental health crisis, this is the time to do something good, even if it is hard.

David Silvers (D) represents District 87, in central Palm Beach County, in the Florida Legislature.

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David Silvers

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