Over 6,700 mental health workers have been recruited over the past year, according to the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC).
The Government has a target of recruiting 8,500 mental health staff by the end of the parliament.
It added that mental health would also be prioritised through the upcoming 10-year plan, with patients able to access support directly through the NHS App, including self-referral for talking therapies.
The plan, which is due this week, will also ‘lay the foundation’ for patients to access mental health support and advice 24 hours a day, seven days a week. This could include AI-driven virtual support, it added.
Alongside this, 85 new mental health emergency departments will be built with the £120m that was announced in the spending review.
Health secretary Wes Streeting said: ‘Not getting the right support for your mental health isn’t just debilitating, it can hit a painful pause button on your life, stopping you working, enjoying time with family and friends or living day-to-day life.
‘Patients have faced the crisis of access to mental health services for far too long, and this government is determined to change that through our Plan for Change to rebuild the NHS.
‘That’s why we’re putting digital front doors on mental health services for patients up and down the country, and harnessing technology to provide 24-hour care. And we’re creating more opportunities for support not just through the NHS App but through care in your community, too.
‘We are already over halfway towards our target of recruiting 8,500 extra mental health workers, and through our upcoming 10 Year Health Plan we will get more people back to health and back to work.’
BMA mental health policy lead Dr Andrew Molodynski said: ‘While recruitment efforts are ongoing, the voices of doctors on the front line report a system that is still struggling to cope as the lack of skilled and trained staff means patients are routinely failed as demand for mental health care far outstrips current capacity.
‘Improving access to mental health support via the app and AI, while possibly helping some people to maintain their wellbeing, is no substitute for in-person evidence-based care for those who have more complex mental health needs and for those who need more immediate care or support. Patients are already able to self-refer to the NHS’s main talking therapies programme in England, so we look forward to seeing how these plans result in tangible benefits to patients.’
He added that a highly skilled workforce ‘must be in place’ to meet increasing demand.
‘There are concerns that the use of specialist mental health A&Es could widen the divide between physical and mental health care and risk diverting resource and staff away from acute hospitals and community mental health teams,’ he said. ‘Rigorous evaluation in the form of funded clinical trials should accompany these changes and be used in longer term decision making.’
It comes as new figures have shown that one in five people aged 16-64 (22.6%) now have a common mental health condition. This is an increase from 18.9% in 2014.
The figures, from the Adult Psychiatric Morbidity Survey, interviewed 7,000 people aged 16 and above.
Commenting on the findings, Dr. David Crepaz-Keay, head of applied research and learning at the Mental Health Foundation, said: ‘These worrying findings clearly demonstrate that England is struggling with growing levels of poor mental health and the legacy of failure of successive governments to tackle the root causes of mental health problems.
‘One in five of us will now experience a common mental health condition in our lifetime. For many of us, this won’t come as a surprise, with a global pandemic and cost of living crisis having dominated the early 2020s, which affected many people’s wellbeing dramatically.
‘Many of the building blocks of life that we rely on to be mentally well – like a good home, a solid income, and a welcoming community – have become more fractured and difficult to access, which has no doubt contributed to the numbers we see today.’
He added that there is a need for more preventative measures within England’s health policies.
‘The upcoming 10-year plan for the NHS presents an opportunity for the government to set out the role that the health system plays in this, extending its reach into preventative work in communities, and we hope that this opportunity will not be missed,’ he said.
Other details of the 10-year plan have already been unveiled, including a partnership between the Government and food retailers to tackle obesity, plans to increase patient access to information, review GP funding allocations as a way to tackle health inequalities, and enable patients to access clinical trials through the app.
