Ryan: SC Legislature should stop cheating police, other first responders out of mental-health treatment

We have come to understand that the emotional trauma that our brave soldiers can suffer on the battlefield can persist and disrupt their lives long after they return to their families. We all agree that they deserve the best medical care and support we can provide them. The VA hospital scandal highlighted how many veterans were being denied treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder for far too long.

There is an even bigger scandal right here at home.

Post-traumatic stress disorder doesn’t just affect soldiers. It can affect our first responders — our policemen, firemen and emergency medical technicians — who face life-and-death situations every day while protecting us right here at home. It can affect a police officer forced in a split second to discharge his or her firearm, a police officer called to the scene of a horrific accident or crime or a firefighter who has lost friends and co-workers in a deadly fire. They serve and protect us in our times of need, but when they suffer emotional trauma we turn our backs on them and deny them the medical treatment and compensation they need for the suffering brought on by doing jobs most of us can’t even imagine.

The public should demand that our first responders receive the very best mental-health treatment, especially after critical incidents. Citizens should have faith that the first responders who serve them are not only physically fit but also mentally healthy.

First our courts and now our Legislature have required that first responders must be doing something that is “unusual and extraordinary” at the time they suffer emotional trauma in order to receive medical treatment and compensation. The problem is that the unusual and extraordinary are what we ask our first responders to do every day, and therefore, they are routinely denied help by our system.

We need to recognize the debt each of us owes our first responders, who risk their lives protecting us every day right here at home. Our Legislature can do this by simply eliminating this unfair rule in cases involving first responders.

First responders should be entitled to the medical care and support they need whenever their treating doctors confirm they have suffered emotional trauma because of the jobs they perform.

Executive Director

S.C. Law Enforcement Officers’ Association

Columbia

This story was originally published April 23, 2015 at 9:21 PM with the headline "Ryan: SC Legislature should stop cheating police, other first responders out of mental-health treatment."