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EDITORIAL: Change in Oklahoma mental health records law can't get here soon enough

Daily Oklahoman (Oklahoma City) - 1/7/2015

Jan. 07--The gains that Oklahoma must make in providing mental health services include doing a better job of ensuring that those who shouldn't have weapons don't get them. Currently the state lags well behind most other states.

The Oklahoman's Jennifer Palmer reported this week that the state had provided only 25 mental health records to the FBI to use in its National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS). As of Nov. 30, there were 3.7 million such records in the system. Oklahoma is one of nine states that have submitted fewer than 100 records.

Oklahoma law makes many of the records off limits. A new law that was approved during the 2014 session of the Legislature and goes into effect July 1 directs court clerks to submit the records to the FBI and to the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation. So, in theory, the number of Oklahoma records entered into the national database should increase substantially.

That must happen. Under federal law, firearms can't be sold to anyone found mentally incompetent by the courts. But Oklahoma, deferring to provisions of the federal Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) and state privacy laws, doesn't provide the FBI with those names.

The OSBI has voluntarily provided NICS with mental health records in a handful of instances when a person has been denied a handgun permit by the agency. Kudos. After all, as one agency official said, if the OSBI is denying a handgun license, that person "probably also should not be able to purchase a firearm."

How many mentally incompetent Oklahomans own weapons? No one knows. But mental illness is a significant problem. According to the state's mental health agency, between 876,000 and 985,000 Oklahomans have a reported mental illness or substance abuse issue.

This state's rate of mental illness is third-highest nationally. Viewed in that context, July 1 can't get here soon enough.

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