The Parity Act in the US and travel insurance in the UK

This is an interesting piece of legisliation. The American health care
system is insurer back which is why it may be necessary. It's brings
parity between mental health problems, including substance misuse
disorders, and physical health.

In a sense there's no need for a legal bill to achieve the same in the
UK because there's no problem of insurer-backed provision. There are
huge inequalities in provision of care for mental and physical illness.
The costs of Herceptin - a cancer drug that offers a few years of extra
life - are in the millions for the treatment of a few hundred people
whereas the thousands of people of clozapine, a drug that significantly
reduces life expectancy, have fewer options and aren't offered
expensive, long term psychological therapies. Admittedly the evidence
for Hereceptin's effectiveness is considerably better however much of
the psychiatric research looks at psychopathology (illness spectrum of
mental health) rather than than the unhappiness (distress spectrum of
mental health).

There is a need for the sort of legislation that ensures equal treatment
in consumption of certain services such as travel insurance. This
effectively works like the American healthcare system however mental
health problems are often excluded or have significantly lower levels of
cover and this is rarely made explicit by providers.