Mental health needs are an emergency

China has a complex history in the treatment of the mentally ill. In 1849, the first institution to treat the mentally ill in China was established by Western missionaries, and some principles instituted by one of them, Dr John G. Kerr, are still valid today. His principles are: mentally ill patients should not be blamed for their actions, they are not to be thrown into prisons but put in hospitals, and they should be treated as human beings, not animals. Western models of treatment, however, were gradually introduced in China only after the launching of reform and opening-up in the late 1970s.

China has a large number of mentally ill patients, to treat whom it does not have adequate services and enough trained personnel. A new "mental health law" adopted recently does contain some important provisions for the benefit of patients. But it does not allow mentally ill patients the right to a legal hearing through a mental health tribunal or guarantee them legal representation, which has been criticized by health professionals and human rights organizations.

According to a study by The Lancet, about 173 million Chinese suffer from some form of mental health disorder. One hundred-fifty-eight million of them have never received professional help. Despite the high number of mentally ill patients, China averages only one psychiatrist for every 83,000 people - about one-twelfth the ratio in the United States and other industrialized countries. This led one psychiatrist to remark: "We are like pandas. There are only a few thousand of us."

The need for psychiatrists is growing. The Lancet study shows the incidence of mental disorders increased more than 50 percent between 2003 and 2008. Although some of the cases can be attributed to improved diagnosis, most are likely to be the result of more stress in their everyday life.

The stress, in fact, could be one of the causes for the increasing number of violent crimes. In 2010, China suffered a series of copycat attacks on kindergartens in which tens of children were stabbed to death, prompting Yin Li, vice minister of health, to declare that China would build 550 hospitals for the treatment of the mentally ill.