Mental health, substance use services get $17 million in Wisconsin

Expert says money should go to finding providers in mental health services 

The mental health community will be getting a huge bump in funding in Wisconsin.

Health services secretary Linda Seemeyer announced an investment of about $17 million getting invested to those who are providing mental health and substance use services.

“Mental health should be treated on parity with the other health provision we have for patients,” Wisconsin Medical Society president Noel Deep said. “At least the funds are being allocated to the right speciality.”

With that, Deep has an idea where that money should go.

“We need to find more people, we need to find more providers for the mental health services,” he said. “We need physicans. We need counselors. And we need social workers.”

With the money being invested into both mental health and substance abuse services, Deep says the opioids crisis in those areas are closely intertwined.

“Sometimes you find that people who are misusing the opioids might have underlying mental health issues, so if we can get them the help they need the desire to depend on opioids would go down,” Deep said.