Mexico City. Tomorrow the amendment to the Public Health Law related to mental health and addiction will enter into force, closing the guarantee of the right of people to receive medical services for treatment of this type of disorder from the first level of care and in public hospitals. to their place of residence.
The law also states that no more psychiatric hospitals will be built and that those that already exist will gradually become outpatient centers or public hospitals with mental health services. This eliminates the psychological asylum model.
The legal reform decree was published today in the Official Gazette of the Federation and also states that service users have the right to informed consent for medical interventions necessary to address their health problem.
It stresses that patients should not be subjected to measures of isolation, forced containment, or any other practice that involves cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment.
The new system also indicates that hospitalization should be a last resort and can be granted as long as respect for patients’ human rights is guaranteed.
He points out that it can only be performed voluntarily and when it provides greater therapeutic benefits to the person in relation to the rest of the possible interventions. If this is the case, the patients will be taken to the hospital “for the time most necessary and at the children’s hospital closest to the user’s home”.