Mijas is a pioneer in Spain in applying this tool. It launched in the United States in 1988. Both the agent Ángel Blanc and the Afesol Vice-President, Cristian González, and the Mental Health Unit Coordinator of Mijas-Fuengirola, Israel Codina, travelled to Miami with the Idiliq Foundation to be trained in the ‘Memphis Model’ and to transfer the keys of this method to the rest of the agents. On Thursday, 16th, the officers participating in this initiative announced the municipality’s adhesion to this program, thanks to which the officers will train to know how to act when dealing with alerts involving people with mental health problems.
“After launching pioneering and much-needed initiatives such as the Local Suicide Prevention Plan. We involved schools and counsellors. Now, we are taking another step forward by promoting the professionals’ training in the Memphis Model of crisis intervention for people with mental health problems”, explained the Mayor, Josele González (PSOE). The Social Services Councillor, Hipólito Zapico (PSOE) pointed out that “it is important that, through Mental Health, they are giving us the necessary training to know how to act in the right way. The Local Police is a tool we have incorporated as a basic element in our daily work in the Social Services”.
Blanc, a police tutor and member of the SIMA corps, will be the person in charge of transferring this training to the staff. “There are things that are different in the United States, from legislation to other protocols, but the problems are quite similar and can be brought to Mijas”. For his part, Cristian González considered it “fundamental that the police are trained, and prepared for any action related to a mental health problem or any other type of disability”. The Idiliq Foundation sponsored this expedition to Miami, in United States of America. “It was easy for us to collaborate with this project as we knew it was a good initiative. Especially, the involvement of the Local Police offers us a greater guarantee of success in the process and the results”, said its President, Juan Miguel Marcos.
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