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Legislative Council - Fifty-First Parliament, Third Session (51-3)
2008-11-12 Daily Xml
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MENTAL HEALTH, RURAL COMMUNITIES

The Hon. R.P. WORTLEY (15:55): I rise today to speak about mental health in rural communities. One in five people experience mental illness, and this number is higher in the bush. It is an epidemic of the modern era because not only are people in rural areas at high risk for depression and other mental illnesses but they are also more isolated, resulting in fewer services being available. Young men are the ones most at risk, closely followed by farm managers and older farm workers.

The stigma associated with mental illness feels like an admission of failure. It tends to have people labelled as violent, dangerous and unpredictable, but of course this is rarely the case. In small towns this stigma can be harder to overcome because of the tight knit groups and the lack of anonymity that tends to go hand in hand with living in the bush, and this means that two-thirds of people suffer in silence.

The majority of mental health afflictions begin between the ages of 15 and 25, and this poses a significant threat to our future workforce and economy. There are many different types of mental illness; to describe them all would take the rest of the day, so I will speak about the most common: bipolar disorder, also known as manic depression, causes severe depression and extreme mood swings; schizophrenia is where a person's thoughts and actions are impaired, and there may be hallucinations and delusions as well as many more symptoms; and eating disorders, such as bulimia, where a person eats and then feels they must purge themselves out of fear of weight gain, and anorexia nervosa, which is the medical term used for someone who starves themselves because when they look in the mirror all they can see is someone overweight staring back at them, even when they are not.

Depression and anxiety are the most common mental health afflictions, and they are prevalent in Australia. Depression is an illness that affects a person's mood, with overwhelming sadness, feelings of helplessness, poor concentration, a loss of interest in anything that person loves doing, withdrawal from loved ones, and the inability to control temper or tears. The more severe the depression, the more symptoms arise, and these can be severely debilitating. In Australia 1,000,000 adults and 100,000 young people live with depression each year; one in four females and one in six males will experience depression in their lifetime.

There are many ways to treat depression. Some can be as simple as a balanced diet and regular exercise; others include medication with mood stabilising drugs or antidepressants, counselling, cognitive therapy, or the use of natural therapies. Antidepressants try to counteract the feeling of depression and work by changing the level of neurotransmitters (or chemical messengers) in the brain, which are thought to be in low supply.

If left untreated, mental illness can result in suicide. People see no other way out. In Australia each year more people die from suicide than in road accidents—approximately 2,500 more each year—and for every suicide there are another 30 attempts. In young people suicide is second only to road accidents as cause of death. Strong indicators of the consideration of suicide are prior attempts, drug or alcohol abuse, and other social factors such as the loss of a close relative or friend, economic hardship, family conflicts and growing social isolation.

According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, rural and remote areas have the highest rate of suicide in the nation. A lack of mental health workers means that people have to travel long distances, which is hard to do if you are running a farm or a small business, and that treatment is sporadic. Also, many rural hospitals do not have the resources to handle a patient during a psychiatric emergency. This lack of mental health services in country areas is considered the most pressing issue that confronts small communities in Australia, and we need to create incentives to attract and retain mental health care workers for the bush or encourage urban carers to expand their services for a few days on a regular basis.

In 1992, the Australian health ministers conference developed the National Mental Health Strategy as a general guide to mental health reform from 1993-1998. The strategy was a success and was reaffirmed in 1998 and 2003. The strategy places emphasis on continual improvement in supporting individuals and their community, promoting mental health, preventing mental health disorders where possible and reducing the impact on individuals and those affected around them.

As a result of this strategy, all levels of Australian government have recognised the need to work together to combat mental illness, to treat each afflicted individual with the respect that they are entitled to and that the services provided are sufficient enough to cope with the demands placed on them.

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