Recommended Reading, June 30

A stick figure of a girl dressed in a superhero costume, captioned 'ANXIETY GIRL! able to jump to the first conclusion in a single bound!' The girl is thinking 'oh, god ... these tights are too tight. i think i'm gonna die!!'
A stick figure of a girl dressed in a superhero costume, captioned 'ANXIETY GIRL! able to jump to the first conclusion in a single bound!' The girl is thinking 'oh, god ... these tights are too tight. i think i'm gonna die!!'

Anxiety Girl, by Natalie Dee. Seen at Learning Log.

Danger Room blog at Wired – [US] Military’s Mental Health Treatment Leader Stepping Down

The director of the military’s top center for post-traumatic stress disorder and traumatic brain injuries is resigning, after ongoing criticism of the facility’s inability to cope with the thousands of troops suffering from the “signature wounds” of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Brig. Gen. Loree Sutton announced the decision to staffers at the Defense Centers of Excellence (DCoE) on Monday, ProPublica is reporting. The center is at the crux of the military’s massive efforts in bolstering both psychological and brain injury-related diagnostics, treatment, prevention and research. Sutton was instrumental in creating the DCoE in 2007, and has held the top job ever since. The timing of her departure, which has yet to be publicly announced, is another indication of the armed forces’ messy, mismanaged mental health program.

restructr! – Keanu Reeves Is More Awesome Than You Think

Paul also told me that Keanu once explained to him why he was getting so many action roles. He had injured himself at some point and had fused vertebrae in his upper back or neck, so when he turned his head, his shoulders and chest tended to follow, because of his limited flexibility. “It makes me look dynamic, rather than disabled” was his explanation.

The Tyee – Canada Short Changes Mental Health

“There is a fundamental structural problem with the Canadian health care system,” former Senator Michael Kirby told a conference on Health of the Homeless today. “Mental health and addiction represent roughly 35 per cent of the disease burden in Canada, yet these illnesses receive only about 5 per cent of the resources,” said Kirby, who now chairs the Mental Health Commission of Canada. Kirby argued that this structural problem costs Canadian taxpayers dearly, and diverts treatment from other health care.

Sunshine Coast Daily – [Australia’s Sunshine] Coast Gets Funs Shot In Arm for Mental Health

MENTAL health services on the Sunshine Coast have received a $1.5 million shot in the arm. Queensland Disability Services Minister Annastacia Palaszczuk said Queensland Health had identified the Sunshine Coast region as a priority area for mental health services. The funding will benefit two non-government organisations providing support to Coast residents recovering from mental illness.

Sydney Morning Herald – Call to Change Disability Bias of Migration Law

MICHELE NISINGIZWE breaks down when she speaks of her mother in Rwanda. The 28-year-old migrated to Australia with her sister seven years ago, fleeing genocide and rape. But the sisters, of mixed Hutu and Tutsi ethnicity, were unable to bring their mother because she had a disability. Gunshot wounds sustained in a civilian attack had maimed her legs. This week the federal government said it was overhauling migration laws that could refuse people on the grounds of a disability. Regulations caused a furore when they threatened to expel a German doctor, Bernhard Moeller, in 2008 because his son had Down syndrome. In the same year, a husband and wife working as renal nurses in Brisbane had to return to Britain because one of their four children had Down syndrome.

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