Senator Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) introduced a bill that would expand access to mental health care for veterans.
Under the Recognizing Community Organizations for Veteran Engagement and Recovery (RECOVER) Act, a three-year pilot program would be created at the Veterans Affairs (VA) for mental health.
The bill proposal would fund the pilot program with $20 million annually for three years to give grants to nonprofits working as outpatient mental health facilities serving veterans.
Nonprofits would be eligible for grants up to $1.5 million per year to help expand or operate their veteran mental health services.
Clinics would be mandated to ensure mental health care veterans are receiving is tailored towards them.
The RECOVER Act requires mental health care services provided to veterans through this program to be free of charge.
The bill proposal also would require these grants to be distributed to both rural and urban areas, with priority given to medically underserved communities and places with high veteran suicide risk.
Nonprofits participating in the program would need to collect outcome data and report results to ensure compliance and measure effectiveness.
The RECOVER Act would require the VA to review the program and issue a report to Congress about how to improve access to mental health care for veterans and better mental health outcomes.
Blackburn said “far too many” of America’s heroes “have been lost to suicide.”
“We need to prevent future tragedies by ensuring veterans have access to timely mental health care,” the senator stated.
“The RECOVER Act would promote public-private partnerships between the VA and community-based mental health care providers and ensure veterans get the quality mental health support they’ve earned,” she said.
In the House, Representative Mike Bost (R-IL-12) introduced the legislation’s companion bill.
In 2021, almost 18 veterans committed suicide daily, according to the VA.
Another VA study showed in 2020 that veterans had a 57 percent higher suicide rate than non-veteran adults.
The RECOVER Act is being backed by veteran groups such as Wounded Warrior Project, Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors, Mission Roll Call, and Cohen Veterans Network.
Mission Roll Call said its national suicide prevention polling from last year showed that almost 80 percent of veterans informed the organization that “preventing suicide requires clinical treatment and community-based support working together, not in isolation.”
“More than 90 percent said it is extremely or very important to include community-based organizations in prevention efforts,” it added.
The organization stated the bill proposal “reflects those priorities by strengthening evidence-based mental health capacity in the community, ensuring providers are trained to understand veteran risk, and requiring outcome reporting so Congress and the VA can assess what is actually working.”
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Zachery Schmidt is the digital editor of The Star News Network. Email tips to Zachery at [email protected].
