Grace Napolitano: “I really am grateful to my colleagues on the other side for their support. This has been a bipartisan effort, both with…”

“I really am grateful to my colleagues on the other side for their support. This has been a bipartisan effort, both with Representative Murphy, myself, and members of the Mental Health Caucus. It has been quite important to us to continue working in airing the issue for this Nation's ability to be able to understand that we need to have more focus on how mental health affects our daily lives, our children in school, our seniors, mental health depression, our veterans, our soldiers in war after several deployments, all of those are parts of the whole that we need to understand in how it affects our lives. The Army recently issued a memorandum to train the chain of command on mental health issues. They are encouraging their servicemembers to talk to their commanders on these issues openly and without fear of retribution in certain areas where they have already been deployed. Parity was passed in February in the House, and it is a good first step and must be signed into law and it will help not only families but business as well. Mr. Speaker, I can't tell you how much I appreciate the time my colleagues have put into this. It is an issue that is very pervasive and we need to encourage more effort into it, not only in funding for research, but also in assistance to be able to render services so that individuals who suffer from these illnesses can continue good, productive lives.”