Volt Malta proposes all psychiatric medications should be added to free medicines list

Volt Malta has proposed that all psychiatric medications should be added to the formulary list and made available through the POYC scheme. 

In a statement, the party said that the mental healthcare system needed to be reconstructed to focus on increased accessibility through decentralization as well as a focus on preventative and rehabilitative care.

Volt Malta also said that more research was needed on mental health difficulties and the socioeconomic effects on Maltese society.

“It has been estimated by WHO that close to 120,000 people in Malta are living with mental health difficulties, making it clear that mental health problems cannot be treated in isolation as individual issues. This is why the party is pushing for community-based practices and the use of multidisciplinary teams to be implemented in the mental healthcare system,” the party said.

Volt Malta prosed the decentralization of mental healthcare clinics through the increase of public mental healthcare facilities aimed at youths and minorities and the opening of 4 psychiatric clinics. Three in Malta and one in Gozo, which would focus on acute or short-term patients.

The party also said that Mount Carmel should be remodelled and renamed. “It should be split into a centre for patients requiring long-term care, and a community and cultural centre which focuses on rehabilitation, community participation, and acquiring new coping skills (arts, sports, etc.) for those who do not work or are still in recovery but no longer require intensive care from both Mount Carmel or the smaller clinics.”

Volt Malta has proposed that more education on mental healthcare, illnesses, and early symptoms be integrated into the PSCD curriculum in secondary schools and promoted in all workplaces and work councils/organizations to increase awareness and education.

‘‘With roughly one in every four people in Malta living mental health difficulties, we need to ensure mental healthcare is given as much importance as physical healthcare’,’ co-president Alexia DeBono said.