VOI - Voice of Indonesia | RRI - Radio Republik Indonesia

Calls to mental health services have increased since the outbreak of coronavirus. But with physical visits to support services dropping due to social-distancing rules, Australians are not taking advantage of the extra services now available to them. Authorities are now urging people to make use of the resources available over the phone and online. Mental health services are part of a $1.1 billion funding boost designed to protect against widespread impacts from the pandemic. A million telehealth mental health consultations worth $35 million had taken place since mid-March, that was stated by Prime Minister Morrison during a press conference on Wednesday (29/04/20) in Australia.

"I noted that there was a 74 million dollars package that was putting place at the early stages of covid 19 outbreak and those packages support has been rolling out across the country and has been get a very good result. 50 percent of mental health consultation is now being done through telehealth as a result of the telehealth changes that we’ve made. And 1 million telehealth, mental health consultation have taken place since mid march and some 35 million dollar spesifically in mental heallth related consultation have been conducted over periode of time since telethealth was putting in place" Prime Minister said.

Prime Minister added that the stay at home has been important but it does come with an increase in anxiety and an increase in pressure on individuals, their mental stress, and that also takes a toll, that’s why Australian Government prepares services to handle the issue. On the same occasion, National Health Commission CEO Christine Morgan said people need to reach out on mental health online services.

"We did come in to this scenario, we did come in to Covid 19 with mental health challenges many of us, with mental health illness. You do still need to contact your mental health services, you can do it now through telethealth, you can do it to the digital services but part of getting through this whole crisis is the way we actually address our mental health and our well being so reach out we will continue to do that" Christine Morgan explain.  

She added that Last month, Beyond Blue received $10 million from a $75 million federal mental health package for a dedicated mental health support service. It offers free information, counselling and referrals online and over the phone. Resources at Head to Health were boosted at the end of March and the website had seen an "enormous" spike in visits. The website brings together a range of apps, online programs, online forums, and resources in one location//NK.