Therese has welcomed an additional £150m of government funding for mental announced recently by the Prime Minister and Health Secretary, Steve Barclay. Anyone experiencing a mental health emergency will benefit from more tailored emergency care and support in the community through specialised mental health ambulances, more crisis services and improved health-based places of safety.
The money will allow for the procurement of up to 100 new mental health ambulances, which will take specialist staff directly to patients to deliver support on scene or transfer them to the most appropriate place for care. It will also fund 150 new projects centred on supporting the provision of mental health crisis response and urgent mental health care. The new projects include over 30 schemes providing crisis cafes, crisis houses and other similar safe spaces, as well as over 20 new or improved health-based places of safety which provide a safe space for people detained by the police. Improvements to NHS 111 and crisis phone lines will also be rolled out.
