Mental-Health Cuts by U.S. States Risk Boosting Health Costs

U.S. states looking to balance budgets by cutting mental-health facilities and Medicaid payments risk increasing health-care costs by pushing psychiatric patients into emergency rooms.

States trimmed 9.5 percent, or more than $1.6 billion, from their mental-health spending from fiscal 2009 to 2012, according to the National Alliance on Mental Illness. The coming budget year will be worse in some states, with Illinois looking to shutter two psychiatric hospitals and Alabama planning to close all of its except for one serving the elderly and another treating criminal cases.