LEIGH SALES, PRESENTER: The Prime Minister says he’ll leave no stone unturned, trying to improve the mental health of Australians.

Every MP and senator is being asked to sign a pledge to do all they can in the next Parliament to stop Australia’s rising rate of suicide.

It’s now more than double the annual road toll.

A group of mental health experts and families of those who’ve taken their own lives launched a campaign today in Canberra to highlight the inadequacies of a system they say is failing to address a national emergency.

Here’s political correspondent Sabra Lane:

(Footage of Malcolm Turnbull holding press conference at scenic outlook, Great Ocean Road)

MALCOLM TURNBULL, PRIME MINISTER: OK. Well, what a beautiful morning.

SABRA LANE, REPORTER: The federal seat of Corangamite is home to the Great Ocean Road, one of the world’s most scenic coastal drives.

The electorate also harbours a dark secret.

MALCOLM TURNBULL: There is no doubt that mental health or mental illness has an enormous cost on our community.

SABRA LANE: According to a new analysis released today, the federal marginal electorate has one of the highest suicide rates in the country.

MALCOLM TURNBULL: It’s a huge challenge. But I can assure you: my Government is keenly aware of the issue of suicide and the issue of mental health overall.

Look, this is a very heartfelt issue, I can assure you. It’s a tough issue. We will leave no stone unturned in our efforts to improve, protect and advance the mental health of Australia; the mental wealth of Australia.

SABRA LANE: For the Prime Minister, it is personal.

MALCOLM TURNBULL: You may not be aware, but my electorate of Wentworth includes The Gap at Watson’s Bay, which is the place in Australia, regrettably, where more people take their lives than anywhere else.

SABRA LANE: Today, a passionate plea as mental health experts converged on Parliament House to warn that millions of dollars of taxpayers’ money have been spent on prevention policies that aren’t working.

IAN HICKIE, PROF., NATIONAL MENTAL HEALTH COMMISSIONER: Medicare’s been a great system, but the simplistic fee for service does not work in this area.

SABRA LANE : Among the group, family members who’ve lost loved ones to suicide; some who’ve even saved children who’ve tried to end their lives.

KERRIE KEEPA, SUICIDE PREVENTION CAMPAIGNER: I hear often that suicide has this ripple effect; that it just goes, you know: this little ripple for the rest of your life.

Again, it’s a fallacy. It’s not a ripple: it’s a tsunami.

SABRA LANE : 7.30 met Kerrie Keepa last year, as she was grieving for her son Chris.

CHRIS BALL (smart phone video, 2014): No-one blame themselves ’cause, like they say, depression is a disease.

SABRA LANE : Twenty-one-year-old Chris Ball recorded this video for his family, shortly before he took his life in 2014.

CHRIS BALL (smart phone video, 2014): I love youse all. There’s nothing youse could have done.

SABRA LANE: Kerrie Keepa’s adding her voice to the campaign to get every MP in the next 45th Parliament to pledge to make a difference to stop the suicide rate from rising. Some signed up today.

KERRIE KEEPA: Because the thought of any other family going through what my family has been through and what my family continues to go through – and I daresay will forever – and not doing anything about it: I wouldn’t be able to sleep at night.

I have to… This is what I have to do. And as probably crazy as it seems, Chris is right beside me, going: “You’ve got this, Mum. Go. Do it.”

IAN HICKIE: Everywhere the Prime Minister goes now – and the Opposition Leader – they’ll be asked about this issue.

(Footage of Labor town hall forum, 20 May)

AUDIENCE MEMBER: That is a massive problem for the youth: it’s mental illness.

(Audience applauds)

SABRA LANE (voiceover): Bill Shorten was asked about it at a recent town hall forum. He says it is a priority for Labor; and asked the audience for a show of hands if they’d known someone who’d tried to take their own lives.

(A significant majority of audience members have their hand up.)

BILL SHORTEN, OPPOSITION LEADER (20 May): Shit. That’s amazing. I just got goose bumps then.

(Footage ends)

SABRA LANE: The numbers are staggering: between eight and 10 Australians die every day at their own hand. It’s estimated another 180 try. Nearly half of them end up in hospital.

In the 10 years to 2014, there was a 22 per cent increase in the suicide rate – and that’s despite more money being spent on preventative measures.

Data released today examines 28 federal seats around the nation, showing the suicide rate compared with the road toll.

In Corangamite, Canning and Longman, the number who end their lives easily eclipses those lost on the road.

CAPTIONS: Corangamite: 111 suicide vs. 65 road toll. Canning: 90 vs. 54. Longman: 162 vs. 68.

SABRA LANE: In each electorate, the report highlights that thousands of people are in a state of high or very high psychological distress.

It’s the first time data’s been broken down to show the impact of suicide in individual electorates. Those in highest stress often are experiencing the end of the mining boom or manufacturing downturn.

IAN HICKIE: We’ve seen this in North America and in Europe, where they failed to respond to actually what was happening in mining, manufacturing, other areas.

We’ve seen suicide rates go up, particularly in men who’ve had limited high school education, who work in the trades, then lose their job or they lose their wife. They’re under financial pressure. Suicide rates go through the roof.

SABRA LANE: Professor Hickie sits on the national mental health commission, which reviewed suicide prevention policies for the Abbott government. It recommended the collection of real-time data. It also recommended 12 pilot programs be set up around the nation, similar to the NDIS roll-out, to test new methods of early intervention, including the use of smart technology to connect those at risk with specialists.

The Government’s taken a different approach, using primary health care networks. It will announce the lead locations soon.

The Opposition’s committed to the trials, but is yet to unveil its policy.

IAN HICKIE: There’s a genuine agreement in Australia that we should be reducing suicide by 50 per cent over the next 10 years. The only way to get there is to focus on those regions with high rates and see significant reductions in those regions.

So, community by community, that can be achieved, but it requires investment; but it requires infrastructure. It requires monitoring. It requires real-time responses.

And most of all: it requires leadership.

KERRIE KEEPA: This can happen to anybody. It doesn’t matter how much money you have. It doesn’t matter your status in life. It doesn’t matter what you do or don’t have. Mental illness does not discriminate.

LEIGH SALES: Sabra Lane with that report.

This article first appeared on ‘ABC’ on 25 May 2016.

Mental health experts are devastated, saying the phone and web support run by the Butterfly Foundation has saved countless patients’ lives.

Christine Morgan, the Butterfly Foundation’s chief executive, said the helpline assisted more than 1,000 people each month, with patients receiving up to an hour of phone and web counselling.

“We’ve been told we only have another 12 months of certain funding for it,” she said.

“To be honest, it fills me with horror because at the moment, this is the only national dedicated service for people with eating disorders.”

The Butterfly Foundation is the country’s peak support organisation for people with conditions such as anorexia and bulimia.

The Federal Government is developing a new centralised online “gateway” as part of its shake-up of mental health services.

A letter from the Federal Department of Health, obtained by the ABC, says: “It will bring together and streamline access to existing evidence-based information, advice and digital mental health treatment and connect people to services through a centralised telephone and web portal.”

Experts say, while streamlining services may be worthwhile, it is crucial that specialised services are still available.

Ms Morgan said patients needed very specific services for eating disorders.

“Somebody suffering an eating disorder does not get the appropriate care and counselling if they ring in a general mental health line,” she said.

The ABC understands that Federal Government funding for the National Eating Disorders Collaboration, which develops treatment guidelines for eating disorders, was also going to be axed, but received a last-minute reprieve.

St Vincent’s Hospital psychiatrist Liz Scott said many of her patients regularly used the Butterfly Foundation’s support service.

“If this was something like cancer affecting young people, we wouldn’t be saying, ‘well let’s take away the phone support line’ or ‘let’s withdraw services’. There would be a major community outcry,” Dr Scott said.

She said eating disorders carried very high rates of mortality.

“One in 10 people who suffer from an eating disorder are dead within 10 years, and if you think about these disorders affecting young people, that’s a horrifying statistic of something that is potentially preventable,” she said.

Phone line ‘a safe place to turn to’

Kath Courts, 26, who is being treated for an eating disorder, said she had used Butterfly Foundation’s phone and web support to get through tough times.

“Calling the phone line was just so important to have that safe space to turn to, to tell someone how I was thinking and feeling and be believed and validated for that,” she said.

Ms Courts said friends with eating disorders had contacted other mental health lines and were told to “go for a walk” or “have an ice cream”.

“To be told to eat something pleasant, it’s like you have absolutely no idea what I’m going through, I really need help and I’m not getting it,” she said.

Ms Courts said had often struggled to find help when she needed it.

“I know for me, if I don’t have anyone to talk to my thoughts get a lot darker and it’s a lot more difficult to manage those urges,” she said.

She said many Australians with eating disorders found it difficult to get ongoing medical treatment.

Ms Courts is hoping the Federal Government will give assurances the support line will be saved.

Other mental health groups face uncertainty

A further 20 mental health groups are also facing an uncertain future, when it comes to their online services.

The groups include Lifeline and SANE Australia.

SANE Australia chief executive Jack Heath said his organisation was keen to be part of the Government’s digital gateway.

“We strongly welcome the Government’s efforts to utilise digital technology,” he said.

Lifeline said it was working with the Government to ensure it had input into the development of the new mental health portal.

A spokeswoman for the Federal Health Department said all government-funded digital mental health service providers, including Butterfly Foundation, were provided with funding for an additional 12 months.

“A Digital Mental Health Advisory Committee has been established to consult and co-design the detailed elements of the new gateway,” she said.

“This group will include representatives of the contracted services providers.”

This article first appeared on ‘ABC’ on 16 May 2016.

Pathways chief executive Alyson Miller said her organisation — which supports 366 Geelong people with mental illness and employs 144 staff — was haemorrhaging money in the NDIS trial and could be forced to close by Christmas.

Pathways clients and staff have been briefed about the possible closure.

Ms Miller predicted other specialist mental health ser­vices across the country would find themselves in the same position.

“My strong view is that the NDIS has underestimated the complexity of people with mental health issues,” Ms Miller said.

“The relative tangibleness of disability versus the ­unknown of mental health. How do you price that?”

This article first appeared on ‘The Advertiser’ on 10 May 2016.

The study, published in the Australian and New Zealand Journal of Psychiatry, is the first to have attempted to estimate the percentage of children between the ages of 0–13 years at-risk of developing adult mental illness.

The researchers used a 2013 review of longitudinal studies on child and adolescent determinants of adult mental illness to compile a list of evidence-based risk factors in childhood that may lead to mental illness.

These risks included genetic influences, hyperactivity, bullying, poor school performance, physical abuse, sexual abuse, neglect and witnessing domestic violence, harsh discipline as well as divorce and separation, among others.

They then used the Longitudinal Study of Australian Children, which follows the development of 10,000 children and families from across the country, to estimate the prevalence of these risk factors in children up to 13 years old.

“At the earliest age, risk factors for adult mental illness are highly prevalent,” the study found.

“Even by infancy, risk factors for adult mental illness are highly prevalent, with 51.7% of infants having multiple risks.”

One in 10 infants were born to mothers who consumed alcohol daily and one in eight to mothers who smoked cigarettes daily during pregnancy, the study found, both risk factors for mental illness.

And 10.5% of infants were in families where the parents had separated, which increased to 18% in 10 to 11-year-olds. Two-thirds of children aged 12–13 years had parents who displayed low warmth or exhibited high hostility or anger, the study also found.

It also found that by the age of nine, more than 18% of children were exposed to more than five risk factors for developing a mental illness.

A co-author of the study and chair of health economics and social policy
at the University of South Australia’s Centre for Population Health Research, Professor Leonie Segal, said the researchers wanted to quantify the amount of children at risk so appropriate funding for intervention services could be allocated by governments.

“We wanted to determine the number of children and families at risk to make a more explicit call for a response” she said. Many of the risk factors identified could be modified or responded to early, she said, such as alcohol use during pregnancy and abusive parenting.

“The difficulty is we have a service system that puts a lot of funds into programs such as the Better Access programs, which provides mental health care plans to patients, but the evidence is those services are going to the more advantaged in society and not towards lower socioeconomic groups who may have higher risk factors,” Segal said.

“We are struggling to get to the most vulnerable families, and I don’t think we have enough therapeutic services on the ground to reach them. Most people want to be a good parent, but if you have enough trauma and adversity in your life, it’s going to be a real struggle and those people need help.”

The executive director of Orygen: the National Centre for Excellence in Youth Mental Health, Professor Patrick McGorry, said some of the risk factors were “truly modifiable causal risk factors which if altered might reduce the risk of later mental ill health”.

“The key thing that needs a lot more research is to see if by modifying these risk factors and intervening early with those with a need for care whether the risks can be reduced,” he said.

There were studies which found that improving parenting behaviour improved immediate problems in children, such as behavioural problems, he said. But he added that long-term preventive effects on mental illness in adult life from such interventions had not been demonstrated.

“Such studies would take decades to carry out [and] are expensive and demanding and mostly have not been done,” McGorry said.

“In the meantime we need to intervene whether in childhood or emerging adulthood when the main surge of need occurs and at the earliest signs of a need for care.”

This article first appeared on ‘The Guardian’ on 27 April 2016.

Australian Defence Force personnel feel their mental health has deteriorated over the past year amid signs of a rift between military leaders and troops.

An internal Defence survey has found the proportion of personnel who rated their own mental health to be good or very good fell from 60.8 per cent to 57 per cent in 2015. The latest survey was taken by more than 20,000 ADF members and public servants though only military personnel answered that question, with the army returning a rate of 56 per cent, the navy 57 per cent, and the air force 60 per cent, all down on 2014 figures.

It comes despite significant investment in mental health services in recent years and an ongoing dispute over whether personnel should be given annual screening. While Defence last year moved to screen members more often, especially those deemed most at risk, it favoured a “voluntary and anonymous online self-screening tool” over annual screening.

A Senate inquiry report recently added to the growing number of reviews and submissions recommending annual screening and the Turnbull government has two months to respond.

“Defence is currently considering the Senate inquiry report and its recommendations for opportunities to build on the significant work we have already undertaken,” the department said in a statement.

While pride in Defence improved last year, and more members felt a sense of belonging, there was a notable deterioration in workplace-specific results. Confidence in Defence senior leadership fell from 54.1 per cent to 49 per cent, with similar concerns in the proportion of respondents who felt valued by Defence for the work they did (down from 45.4 per cent to 42 per cent), encouraged to have a positive work-life balance (down from 57.3 per cent to 55 per cent) and trust in Defence to operate with fairness and integrity (down from 64.9 per cent to 63 per cent). The proportion of military personnel who felt they had no personal control over their career increased from 34.6 per cent to 37 per cent.

In a letter to The Australian last week, ADF Chief Mark Binskin, Vice-Chief Ray Griggs and the chiefs of the army, navy and air force responded to criticism of the ADF for its handling of the social media activity of Islamic affairs strategic adviser Captain Mona Shindy, saying they were pushing for “much needed cultural change”.

But Australian Defence Association executive director Neil James warned diversity should not be prioritised at the expense of the defence force’s other needs.

Tasmanian senator Jacqui Lambie, who served as a soldier between 1989 and 2000, will use the upcoming federal election to campaign for Defence personnel to be given greater support.

This article first appeared on ‘The Australian’ on 19 April 2016.

The Premier said Australia’s political leaders were “being a bit cute” about the full cost of the insurance scheme.

He said the blowout was “way beyond what’s being talked about” and preparation for the full NDIS rollout was “progressing fairly slowly”.

“We know enough to know the final cost has blown out and that’s because of people using the service, the cost of delivery,” Mr Barnett said. “We don’t know exactly but it’s not marginal.”

A spokeswoman for Federal Social Services Minister Christian Porter denied there had been a budget blowout.

But she confirmed the rollout of the full NDIS would be delayed in WA, despite it beginning in all other States and Territories in July.

After former disability services minister Helen Morton’s exit from State Cabinet last week, Mr Barnett said there would be no change of direction from the State Government on the NDIS.

He still wanted WA to administer delivery of its disability services, rather than outsourcing them to the National Disability Insurance Agency in Geelong like the other States.

Noting that the not-for-profit sector had run WA’s disability services for the past 25 years, he cautioned other States they were going into “uncharted waters”.

Mission-focused not-for-profit organisations received much of WA’s disability funding to deliver services, but the NDIS opened it up to for-profit service providers.

“You will get full-profit organisations coming in, seeking a huge business opportunity and they may be very, very good but that’s not consistent with the way in which it’s developed,” Mr Barnett said.

Mr Porter’s spokeswoman said estimates were that about 460,000 people would be eligible for the NDIS at a cost of about $22 billion in 2019-20. She said the scheme would be rolled out using a “carefully managed, staged approach” to ensure the best outcomes for people with a disability and their families.

The future rollout of the NDIS in WA would be informed by the outcomes of the independent comparative evaluation of two trials in WA — the State Government’s My Way model in the Lower South West, Cockburn and Kwinana, and the Federal Government’s NDIA-run model in the Perth Hills — due to be completed in August.

This article first appeared on ‘The West Australian’ on 5 April 2016.

The statement by the country’s leading psychiatric organization has helped heighten the recent moral panic around LGBT issues in Indonesia by lending scientific credibility to the idea – which many Indonesians unfortunately believe – that being LGBT is a disease that can be both spread and treated.

But the idea that being LGBT is a mental disorder that can be “cured” is simply not backed up by modern science, as detailed in a new letter from the American Psychiatric Association (APA) to PDSKJI.

The letter, co-signed by APA president Dr. Renée Binder and APA medical director Dr. Saul Levin, begins by expressing the APA’s concern over PDSKJI’s recent statements about classifying being LGBT as a mental disorder:

“We respectfully ask that you reconsider your position, because the latest and best scientific research shows that different sexual orientations and gender expressions occur naturally and have not been shown to pose harm to societies in which they are accepted as a normal variant of human sexuality. In fact, research shows that efforts to change an individual’s orientation – so-called “conversion therapy” or “reparative therapy” – can be harmful, and are linked to depression, suicidality, anxiety, social isolation and decreased capacity for intimacy.”

The letter goes on to say that members of PDSKJI may have misunderstood “the significance of recent scientific findings, which show that multiple factors, including both biological and environmental contributors, play roles in sexual orientation and gender identity. In short, one’s orientation is not a choice.”

In defending PDSKJI’s assertion that LGBT is a mental disorder, PDSKJI member Suzy Yusna Dewi told the Jakarta Post there was “not enough data to support the idea that the conditions were caused by biological factors, adding that limiting inappropriate social interaction could be effective in curbing such abnormal sexual tendencies.”

However, the letter from the APA cites numerous studies that show there is a huge body of data to support the idea that being LGBT is caused by biological factors, including a landmark review of 10 years worth of biological research that concluded “genetic research using family and twin methodologies… produced consistent evidence that genes influence sexual orientation.”

Based upon all of this research, the letters states: “It is the position of the APA that there is no rational basis, scientific or otherwise, upon which to punish or discriminate against LGBT people.”

The letter ends by saying:

“With all due respect to you and to the Indonesian people, we advise that classifying homosexuality and gender expression as intrinsically disordered will only lead to coercive ‘treatments’ and violence against those who pose no harm to society and cannot change who they are. We hope that providing you with the additional scientific data above will further inform your decision. We urge you to consider the evidence contained herein and to reconsider your decision.”

Unfortunately, we believe it is highly unlikely that PDSKJI will reconsider its position based on this letter. If they respond to it at all, it will be to accuse the APA of pushing “foreign values” onto Indonesia.

As PDSKJI member Suzy told the Jakarta Post, “We must respect Indonesian traditions, which culturally do not accept same-sex marriage, and we should not bow to the influence of foreign values that may not fit in with our values.”

But this is not about “foreign values”. This is about science. And psychiatrists, like all doctors, are supposed to be scientists.

If PDSKJI wants to continue supporting discrimination against LGBT individuals by saying they have mental disorders, then they can do so on the basis of religion or culture. But if they do so, then they should stop pretending that there is any scientific basis to their statements.

Western Australia Police are investigating the girl’s death, after her body was found on Sunday night in Looma, a remote community in far-north Western Australia. A police spokesman said they did not consider it suspicious.

The coordinator of a federally-funded trial of the indigenous suicide critical response unit, Gerry Geratos, is travelling to to Looma this week.

Eighteen indigenous people have reportedly killed themselves in remote parts of Western Australia since December.

Sandy Davies, the deputy chairman of the National Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Organisation, said that child suicide was a growing problem in indigenous communities. Children’s exposure to family violence was a “major contributor” to the mental health of young people, he said.

Mr Davies, who is based in Geraldton, Western Australia, said services needed more funding for mental health, with remote communities having limited access through Aboriginal Medical Services and the Royal Flying Doctor Service.

“There are millions of dollars going into mental health in Western Australia but very little reaches the people who need it,” he said.

“We must be delivering services to the people, not (forcing) them to come to the services because Aboriginal people in remote communities are on the lowest incomes in the country.”

State and federal governments should also publicise the number of suicides in different regions, so that service providers could better understand the problem and help families impacted by suicide. Mental health professionals also needed to work with community leaders to encourage people to seek help for their problems.

Dr Fiona Shand, a senior research fellow on suicide prevention at the Black Dog Institute, said that indigenous children up to 14 years were nine times more likely to kill themselves than non-indigenous children. Those aged 16 to 24 were four to five times more likely to kill themselves than non-indigenous people in that age group.

Dr Shand said that indigenous children had worse mental health outcomes than non-indigenous children due to entrenched disadvantage in Aboriginal communities and intergenerational trauma, which led to higher rates of family violence and substance use.

“It’s difficult to think that someone so young can feel so much despair and hopelessness but they can,” she said.

“The risk with younger people is the younger we are, the more likely we are to act on an impulse and the harder it is to regulate strong emotions.”

She said that young people generally needed to be better screened for mental health problems, particularly in “at-risk” groups.

An Australian Bureau of Statistics study said on Tuesday that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders were almost twice as likely to die by suicide than non-Indigenous Australians. Between 1.4 to 3.6 children per 100,000 died by suicide in Australia between 2010 and 2014, it said. The Northern Territory had the highest rate of child suicide, at 12.7 deaths per 100,000 of the population.

Lifeline 131 114

beyondblue 1300 224 636

SuicideLine 1300 651 251 (this service is Victoria based)

MensLine 1300 789 978

Kids Helpline 1800 551 800

This article first appeared on ‘Sydney Morning Herald’ on 9 March 2016.

In a report from The Washington Post, multiple psychologists claim they have experienced a rise in stress from their patients, all of whom have expressed fear over Trump’s rise to power. Their sessions, the psychologists allege, are peppered more frequently with talks of the businessman. They have discussed an acute anxiety with their patients when it’s discovered that one of their family members or close friends supports Trump, or with the businessman’s recent hesitation in disavowing David Duke, a former grand wizard of the Ku Klux Klan. (Bustle has reached out to the Trump campaign for comment.)

Judith Schweiger Levy, a New York-based psychologist who has noticed that talk of the GOP front-runner have increased as of late, says she is also nervous about the prospect of a Trump presidency. She told the Post:

Part of the reason he makes people so anxious is that he has no anxiety himself. It’s frightening. I’m starting to feel anxious just talking about him.

Massage therapists are also saying that their patients are being affected by Trump’s rise in politics. Amanda Long, a massage therapist based out of Arlington, Virginia, also told the Post about her clients’ anxieties over the GOP frontrunner. She claims she frequently has to calm patients down after they vent about Trump before she can began her massage.

Whether or not “Trump Anxiety” can be called a “real” diagnoses is currently unforeseen. But that doesn’t mean people can’t experience legitimate anxiety over some of Trump’s more heinous proposals. Particularly for Latino and Muslim Americans, his campaign promises turn into threats over their family, home, and rights to citizenship.

Trump’s rise in popularity is certainly something the GOP has been stressing over, in any case. His successful push to the Republican nomination has surprised the GOP establishment, who continue to work to block the businessman from gaining any more ground. They have put forth an effort to vet more moderate candidates like Marco Rubio, and 2012 presidential nominee Mitt Romney recently gave a speech against the boisterous candidate.

But with the businessman’s Super Tuesday wins last week, it looks like there may be a lot more people — particularly those in the GOP establishment — who might be checking into the doctor for “Trump Anxiety.”

This article first appeared on ‘Bustle’ on 8 March 2016.

This week the Supreme Court is considering whether the law’s requirements place an “undue burden” on women that would prevent them from reasonably accessing abortion.

What’s perhaps most alarming about this case is that a Supreme Court Judge involved has been loudly voicing his “concern” for the mental health of women who have abortions. He seems to imply that by banning abortion, we can protect women from depression.

Supreme Court judge Justice Anthony M Kennedy, who is one of the most powerful men in the US, stuck his oar in during a speech in 2007, saying: “While we find no reliable data to measure the phenomenon, it seems unexceptionable to conclude some women come to regret their choice to abort the infant life they once created and sustained. Severe depression and loss of esteem can follow.”

No reliable data to measure the phenomenon. Isn’t that strange?

For a Supreme Court judge – the same man in whose hands the fate of 40 abortion clinics in Texas lies this week – it seems a little wacky to speculate on something, and to turn that speculation into a law which would have a profound impact on millions of women. Even wackier when you find out that a simple Google search could have put him right.

The American Psychological Association stated as early as 1989 that a legal abortion “does not pose a psychological hazard for most women”.

The John Hopkins University also found in 2008 that long-term mental health problems – sadness, guilt, regret and depression – occur “in only a minority of women” who have had an abortion.

Meanwhile, the Guttmacher Institute discovered in 2011 that “negative feelings are no worse after an abortion than after carrying an unwanted pregnancy to term”, and rather it is the stigma of having an abortion that can have negative mental health consequences rather than the procedure itself.

But if Republicans can’t convince women that they will feel racked with guilt for evermore after having an abortion, the lack of access to healthcare facilities should be able to do the job.

Abortion clinics in the US as a whole are already struggling with increasing amounts of debt as they work to operate under new, stricter standards that make them more like surgical centers rather than family planning clinics. Bloomberg data show that 162 clinics have shut down in the US since 2011, with just 21 opening in the same period.

Now let’s imagine that some women have no option but to carry an unwanted pregnancy to term. Surely they are just as likely, if not more likely, to suffer mental health problems? That seems to carry much less of a logical leap than assuming that a woman who wants an abortion and then is able to access an abortion clinic will end up “severely depressed”.

Justice Kennedy and his cohort do not have the ability to regulate depression, just as they can’t regulate good and bad parenting.

Ultimately, it’s irrelevant what harm a woman experiences, either if she has an abortion and faces guilt or carries the pregnancy to term and struggles with the mental effects of childbirth and parenthood, such as postnatal depression. Postnatal depression is, after all, the most common complication of a pregnancy. Abortion doesn’t raise the rate of mental health problems – but having babies does.

It’s also irrelevant whether you, the reader, agree with someone terminating their pregnancy.

The point is that women have a choice in the first place – and, as this court case shows, it’s a choice we can never take for granted.

This article first appeared on ‘Independent’ on 2 March 2016.