Transcripts For CSPAN HHS Secretary And Others On Behavioral

Have you and lasted nearly 300 billion in investments to Community Behavior Health Clinics around the country by the crisis support. This is just under one hour. Treating Mental Health on par with physical health. Let this be remembered as the year where we laid the gauntlet to everyone. We challenged everyone to join us. Certified Community Behavioral Health Clinics have only been around for a short amount of time. But they have absolutely made a mark. I think there is nothing more fitting then to have the champions and perhaps the instigators, the people that got most in trouble, the most in the way of making sure we got this done, senator roy blunt with us today. I think it is only fitting that they get to talk about the success of really embedding within america what we consider essential health care for all americans. 90 million 90 percent of americans believe that there is a Mental Health crisis. Today, we are talking about providing to americans 24 7 support for crisis care. That is something that has only been available to some in some places but depending on your income and your zip code, you could be totally. That will start to change. We are creating a very Healthy Partnership with our brothers and sisters in Law Enforcement. So that we can Work Together to address the needs of the community and the challenges we all face, not all of them are challenges requiring a Law Enforcement officer. Some of them are just in need of a helping hand, caring face. Think of this as a year will be launched big. 988 is on board. 98 it becomes a place where you get help and if we do it right when you call that three digit number, you will get the support you need. That becomes the glue that really brings together this notion of providing health care to americans. We are connecting the dots to make sure we give everyone the full health care. Here is the best part. Ccd acs are here to stay. From senator stabenow to administrator brooks le sueur, and to sergeant chad matthews of the Montgomery County police, thank you for being part of this. Now let me ask senator stabenow to step forward. It is a wonderful day and when i think that we have been working toward for about 10 years. It is so great to be here. Thank you for your leadership in hhs we thank you so much for the partnership that has gone on for the last number of years. It is wonderful to have people on the frontline making a difference, saving peoples lives. Thank you so much. We have been working this for about 10 years but people have addiction related challenges and have been waiting a lifetime for this. Back in 1963, when you first introduced the Mental Health treatment act and spoke about president john f. Kennedy, the last law that he ever signed before being shot was the law to strengthen and develop community Mental Health. We dont want people being housed without treatment. We are going to close those and provide community treatment. Half of that happened. The hospitals got closed. The community work, the excellent quality efforts that people lead in the community did not happen. It is now going to happen. It is now happening. We are finally going to treat health above the neck the same as health care below the neck. In 2014, our excellence in health and mental treatment act created certified Behavior Health clinics. This is important. We modeled it after and you can get full funding for the work of the clinic through medicaid. We modeled it after that. This is evidencebased which is why when they came and said we want to do something on Mental Health, everybody started to about programs and roy and i went stop, we have an evidencebased program that has been operating and transforming what is happening. That is what we need to do. That is what we did. It is really transformative. The overall funding is the largest investment in Mental Health and Addiction Treatment ever. When you talk on the hotline, Everything Else is in there. It is the largest investment in Mental Health and addiction related services ever in our country. I want to thank President Biden for making this happen with his unity agenda. We are announcing the beginning of that. They will be given an opportunity to put together those high quality standards. And then build from there stepbystep, we are going to take this nationwide. I will bid you one other thing. We want you to get support across the country for this concept in the appropriations process where senator blunt is a key leader. We developed startup grants. Grants to go without medicaid funding. We now have those individual clinics in over 41 states. Here is what we now. This is why we were able to convince colleagues to make this part of this important legislation that was passed. People who receive Services Show a 72 reduction in hospitalization. A 69 reduction in emergency. They spent 60 less time in jail. Jfk said one true measure of a nation is it success in fulfilling the promise of a better life. Let this be the measure of our nation. Today, we fulfill that promise. I want to introduce my partner who what i who i would not have been able to move forward in this with. Senator roy blunt. [applause] we are both glad to be here. We are happy to see what we think its a significant step in the right direction. Almost everybody says the Mental Health system is not working the way it should be. We immediately talked to each other and then we started calling everybody who was working on putting a package together to explain that we did have a system that was working. Thank you for your leadership in this and your friendship and the time that we all three worked together in the congress and working together here. Administrator brooks leisure. In all of our discussions about what could happen here. Places where you can go 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year that had the kind of staff that the law requires you to have. Not only that, the complete availability, but also staff thats available to do what needs to be done. You know, nih the National Institute of health for a long time has used a number that generally Something Like one in five adult americans has a diagnosable and almost always treatable Behavioral Health issue. 20 of the adult population. My guess is after the last few years of covid and isolation and other things, that number is probably about the same for the total population. How do we deal with that in a better way than weve been dealing with it. So we started those 10 states, then we decided we could actually expand that units that met all the criteria, the qualified criteria. Uh that could do what those states were doing basically statewide and largely often largely bigger communities. 300 communities now have c c. B. H. C. S in them. 40 states already, including the 10 pilot states have some element of this program. They know its working; they know that the, the finance structure based on the federally qualified Health Center structure works. Its not just for medicaid patients, its for everybody. You know, the way those facilities work is if youve got insurance that covers you in those facilities, you can go there if youre under a Government Program that covers you, you can go there if you dont have any of those things, you can go there and theres a very manageable sliding scale so that if this is a facility thats close to you and available to you, you can use that facility telehealth also works particularly well with Behavioral Health, youre more likely to be further away from your for your behavioral provider than you are your other health provider. Making all of that come together in a way that keeps people in the community that keeps people with their family that keeps people at their job, all that critically possible. And here we are. As senator stabenow mentioned 59 years ago this month, the bill was signed that these big facilities would be replaced with facilities that were in your community that were going to meet your needs in a better way and allow all of those things to happen. We now have the possibility for 50 states and were gonna talk about how that happens in a minute for all 50 states to take this big step forward Law Enforcement for too long in the emergency room, Law Enforcement in the emergency room really for most of that, 50 years after those big facilities got closed in the seventies uh become became the de facto Mental Health Delivery System for the country. Nobody is well served by that Law Enforcement isnt well served by that. The emergency room is not well served by that and certainly the people that need help and that crisis moment arent well served by that brent macguineas here from the missouri Behavioral Health council. Uh theyve kept really good records, not just of the Mental Health efforts going on, but also the difference it makes in peoples other health. Sen stabenow mentioned that hospitalizations were 672 lower. Those hospitalizations are lower are often not lower because they would be in the hospital for Mental Health. Theyre lower. Because if your Mental Health is in a good place, uh you show up for your other appointments, you go to dialysis, you take your medicine, you eat better, sleep better, feel better about yourself and you dont wind up in the hospital for the other Health Concerns that can put you in the hospital. There is a dramatic decline in what happens in peoples overall health. If youre dealing with their Mental Health, thats an awful big part of the 72 reduction in hospital visits arent hospital visits that you would have made hospital stays for Mental Health. But hospital stays, you would have made for your other Health Concerns that you werent dealing with because your Mental Health concern wasnt being dealt with. Um nine years ago, we were talking about that bill that had been signed 50 years earlier. Uh senator stabenow and i both couldnt be more happy to be here to see us at this moment. We know this works, we know the difference it makes in peoples lives and the communities they live in and its a great time and certainly one of the people that will be incredibly important in making this work is dr. Miriam delphin richman who will be here to explain from her point of view the nuts and bolts of how this works of how states can apply, how they can be in that 10 year effort. Were hoping at least 10 states every two years will join the 10 states that are already making this program work and know it works and uh doctor thank you for all youre doing to make this work. Good morning, good morning everyone and thank you senator blunt. You know, i have to say it is just such a pleasure to be here with uh secretary becerra with senator stabenow. Senator blunt administrator brooke slash or uh from the centers for medicare and Medicaid Services uh jennifer and certain charred matthews, thank you everyone for joining us today. Um you know senator blunt and senator stabenow, i want to thank you for your steadfast leadership and support and dedication to all americans. Uh so thank you for the work that you do every day. Um you are tremendous champions for this model of excellence uh in Behavioral Health care and we heard about some of the impacts and outcomes of this model already. Um administrator books for sure. I so appreciate our partnership in this work uh and look forward to our continued partnership as we move this work forward. Um i have to say we are so pleased to announce that hhs through samhsa authorized by the Bipartisan Safer Community act um is expanding for states, uh the opportunity to submit applications for 15 million in planning grants to develop certified Community Behavioral Health Clinics. Um this underscores the biden harris administrations commitment to strengthening Mental Health of all americans. In early 2020 23 will review applications uh and then award 15 states 1 million apiece to begin their planning process. So really excited about this this process. Um in the planning phase what states will do is they will work towards uh federal standards for c. C. B. H. C. Model. Um theyll also establish prospective Payment Systems for medicaid reimbursable services, so again the collaboration with uh connection with cms um and then theyll also prepare an application to be part of a four year demonstration. Uh so wonderful opportunity for states. Um and so let me talk briefly about what this means. Um we know that c. C. B. H. C. S. Are the kind of care that you would want your neighbor to receive, that you would want to receive yourself that you would want a friend to receive or a family member. Let me show you how this works. Within the first six months, we see decreased homelessness, we see decreased amount of time in correctional facilities, we see decreased amount of time spent in Emergency Rooms for Behavior Health care, we see decreased patient hospitalizations as well and we also see an increase in positive functioning for individuals that are struggling with Behavioral Health challenges. This is a model that we know. It is demonstrated to make a meaningful impact. The model is innovative, it is transformative. It provides 24 hour care, crisis care. 21 hours a day, seven days a week. Equally important, the model helps and is available for anybody regardless of their ability to pay or where they live. The access is a real critical component of this model. With this expansion, expansion of eligibility and a recent increase in funds, in just a few short years, we have gone from 70 to over 400 across the country. That is a significant increase in access. A significant feat led by President Biden and members of congress, specifically senator stabenow and senator blunt. They were the original sponsors of this opportunity. I would like to close with this. This is a piece that we want everyone to take away. We know that hope is so important. Just knowing that the care is available and that it is culturally appropriate. Also, hope affirmed by the knowledge that we are demonstrating a commitment to improve the Behavioral Health of the nation. Now, it is my pleasure to introduce our administrator. She is the administrator of cms and she will talk about this model. We are just so thrilled to be here. I would say it is so important for us as a department to make sure people are getting care in the most appropriate setting. Demonstration is to really make sure that people across this country are getting care where they needed. As you have heard, we are deeply appreciative of both senator stabenow and senator blunt for a decade of working to make sure that today would be a reality because as the secretary mentioned, we are now in the midst of a Mental Health crisis in our country and we had hhs are really committed to doing what we can to make sure we turn this around. I will just say that we are working closely with our colleagues on this program that really allows states to test new strategies and deliver and reimburse services in an outpatient setting. Samsara provides the planning grants. Cms is responsible for implementing the enhanced federal medicaid reimbursement authorized for the services that are delivered. This Funding Provides the ongoing investment in these behavioral Health Clinics and helps them continue to provide a wide range of services they offer. I want to mention that this is just part of what we are doing at cms to ensure that people in medicaid, chips or marketplace coverage get quality, affordable, acceptable Behavioral Health care. As the secretary said, this is part of a big package of really making sure people are getting the care they need. In medicaid, we are working with their estate partners to expand support for communitybased mobile crisis innovation intervention services. Thanks to the bipartisan communities act, they are often working to provide Additional Support for schoolbased services for children covered by medicaid. Provided essential health care in schools including Mental Health services can reach children and youth where they are and help them to ensure they get the care they need. That is why the senator said this is the largest investment and Mental Health and Substance Abuse assistance in a generation because of some of these other provisions. And medicare, we are working to expand access to needed Substance Abuse treatment as well as bringing providers to make sure the