Pandemics and Mental Health: an Unfortunate Alliance

Mental health issues not only affect the person but society as a whole. This is especially apparent during times of pandemics or other social unrest situations as currently seen during the COVID-19 crisis. It can manifest itself as violence (towards or from the mentally ill person), increased substance use, increased overcrowding of our prisons, tackling with comorbid medical conditions which have worsened due to lack of initial attention (a particularly big problem among the mentally ill), increased strain on tax payers, and overall affecting the quality of everyone's life. Furthermore, mental health maladies can cause increase work absenteeism and poor work performance and decreased economic productivity. The stigma associated with mental health also leads to poor funding form policy makers, as there is a lack of forceful advocacy in dealing with these issues. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that the loss of productivity due to mental health disability accounts to close to 5% of the gross national product of the European Union (WHO 2019). One of the most crucial causes of lack of mental screening, recognition, and treatment is the limited availability of mental health trained providers. The physician assistant profession is in a unique role to fill this niche as they have been trained as generalists who specialize only when getting trained in their specific field during their employment. Additionally, the fact that PAs do have lateral mobility does lend this profession to meet the needs of society, especially in the psychiatric fields, in a prompt and competent manner. The need for physician assistants (PAs) in psychiatry and addiction medicine is a nationwide trend resulting in existing and emerging shortages of psychiatric and addiction medicine providers. They can provide relatively inexpensive, easily accessible, and good quality care to their clients.