ACT NOW GEORGIA: Mental Health Bill is Moving Unchanged, We Need Your Voice
Our Stand: At-A-Glance
- HB1013 passed out of the Senate Health and Human Services Subcommittee UNCHANGED on Wednesday, March 23rd. This sweeping 77-page bill changes laws relating to “courts, education, health, insurance, mental health, public officers and employees, and social services."
- Please email your Senator and leadership on this committee asking them to OPPOSE HB1013. Our health choices must remain in the home and should NOT BE OUTSOURCED to the Federal or Global level. We need your action and voice, please share with 5 of your friends now!
- Below is a reminder of what this bill, if passed, will do in the state of Georgia.
- HB1013 requires Georgians to be in “compliance with federal law regarding mental health parity.”
- “Parity” refers to the way insurance pays for mental health and substance abuse treatments in comparison to the way it pays for illnesses and accidents. But this bill is so much more! It changes the standards for involuntary commitment and the rights one has in the courts once they are detained against their will.
- Diagnoses and the standard of care for mental health and substance abuse issues are expanded under this bill to include “recommendations from federal agencies,” and the World Health Organization’s International Classification of Diseases.
- The bill will create an Office of Health Strategy and Coordination under direction of the Governor, with the purpose of “centralizing” and strengthening and the health infrastructure through “interconnecting health functions and sharing resources across multiple state agencies,” and finding ways to “maximize federal funds.” In other words, this new office will increase mental health data sharing, and adoption of federal laws in the state of Georgia (because federal laws get implemented at the state level through incentives of federal funding).
- This bill will increase government control over your family’s mental health.
- This bill will have a massive economic impact on Georgia. It does more than require insurance companies to pay for mental health services; it creates multiple new councils, agencies, task forces, and offices, and increases public officers needed to respond to emergencies.