Reframing Malta’s Approach to Mental Healthcare

Volt Malta proposes a restructuring of the current mental healthcare system to one that focuses on increased accessibility through decentralization, a focus on preventative and rehabilitative care in conjunction with available psychiatric services, as well as increased education and comprehensive research and studies into mental illness and mental health difficulties, as well as their the socioeconomic effects in Maltese society.

Mental Health is an issue that Volt Malta believes should be tackled more holistically. 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, with the goal to focus on strengthening the individual’s life skills and help towards reintegration into the community.

Volt Malta also proposes decentralization of mental healthcare clinics through the increase of public mental healthcare facilities aimed at youths and minorities, as well as the opening of 4 psychiatric clinics (3 in Malta - North, Central, and South - and 1 in Gozo) which focuses on acute or short-term patients. 

The party also proposes that Mount Carmel go through a complete remodel and name change, and split into a center for patients requiring long-term care, and a community and cultural center 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.

To increase awareness and education on mental health and the effects of mental illness, Volt Malta proposes 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. 

Lastly, accessibility to medication is also something that Volt Malta feels should not include any socio-economic barriers. Currently, a number of psychiatric medications are included in the government formulary, but this is not enough - all psychiatric medications should be included in the formulary and made available through the POYC scheme.

‘‘With roughly 1 in every 4 people in Malta living mental health difficulties, we need to ensure mental healthcare is given as much importance as physical healthcare’’, Alexia DeBono, District 8 & 9 Candidate, and Co-President of Volt Malta