On December 27, 2023, the President of the Nation sent to the Lower House of Congress the bill to be debated in extraordinary sessions. Among other points, incorporates amendments to the mental health regime.
Mental health
The bill incorporates amendments to Law No. 26657 on Public Health, Rights to the Protection of Mental Health:
- Empowers the judge to adopt urgent care measures and shall subsequently carry out the corresponding interdisciplinary evaluation.
- Involuntary admission. It incorporates the possibility for the parents or whoever exercises parental responsibility, guardian or at the request of the Judge, upon request of the competent administrative body, to request the internment of a minor who suffers from addiction to psychoactive substances that seriously compromises his/her integral health or psychophysical development. The professional opinion of the interdisciplinary team must be attached.
- Allows the official advocate of the involuntarily committed person to oppose externalization.
- It eliminates the prohibition of the creation of new asylums, neuropsychiatric or monovalent internment institutions, public or private.
- It eliminates the responsibility of the members, professionals, and non-professionals of the health team to inform the Review Body and the competent judge of any suspected irregularity involving undignified or inhumane treatment of persons under treatment or undue limitation of their autonomy. This procedure could be carried out under confidentiality of identity and had the due guarantees of safeguarding the source of labor and was not considered a violation of professional secrecy.
- The Review Body shall be made up of multidisciplinary teams and each team shall be composed of a psychiatrist, a psychologist, a technical specialist in addictions, a technical specialist in child and adolescent issues and a lawyer specializing in the subject.
