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Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, with the tragic mass shooting last week at the Washington Navy Yard, our country has again been ravaged by preventable gun violence. America must confront these events and their causes to prevent future tragedies.

Since 2007, according to the FBI, there have been 146 reported mass shootings. Far too often, a large contributing factor to this recent surge in violence is untreated mental illness; and in far too many instances, the perpetrators are former members of our military. Our Nation must bridge the gaps in our current mental health system to avoid more tragedies.

The President recently unveiled his BRAIN Initiative. It calls for $100 million in funding to advance our understanding of the human mind. Supporting this proposal will go a long way to furthering our understanding of the causes and conditions that afflict those who wish to harm others and themselves.

Further, Congressman McKinley of West Virginia and I have introduced H.R. 1615, the Examining America's Mental Health Services Act of 2013. The bill requires the Secretary of Health and Human Services and the National Academies' Institute of Medicine to conduct a comprehensive study on the gaps in our Nation's mental health services and to explore how these gaps increase the risk of violent acts. Experts such as former Army Vice Chief of Staff Dr. Peter Chiarelli, Dr. Joseph Calabrese of Case Western Reserve University, U.S. Army Colonel Carl Castro, and Dr. E. Fuller Torrey, head of the Stanley Foundation, would be prime candidates to lead breakthrough national initiatives on mental health.

Part of our comprehensive effort should focus on (1) accelerating funding for brain research and neuropsychiatric treatment; (2), reforming military enlistment, discharge procedures and integrating the Department of Defense and Department of Veterans Affairs' medical records systems; (3), instituting early childhood behavioral screening in schools; and, (4), restricting gun and ammunition access to those who have serious behavioral disorders.

Additional focus on mental illness and gun access is imperative. The Navy Yard tragedy resulted in the deaths of 13 of our citizens with eight additional people injured. The perpetrator, Aaron Alexis, was aged 34, a Navy Reserve veteran and a contractor to the U.S. Navy. He joined the Naval Reserve and began experiencing conditions that many would describe as related to PTSD, with demonstrable neuro conditions such as schizophrenia or paranoid schizophrenia. However, he was allowed to purchase a Remington 870 pump action shotgun and two boxes of ammunition. Individuals who suffer from these types of ailments should not have access to weapons and stockpiles of ammunition.

Unaddressed mental illness continues to be prevalent in many of our Nation's traumatic mass shootings, and they involve perpetrators who are private citizens as well.

We recall so sadly in Tucson, Arizona, when our own former dear colleague, Rep. Gabby Giffords, and current colleague, Representative Ron Barber, miraculously survived a mass shooting in which six others lost their lives after a deranged gunman, Jared Lee Loughner, opened fire at a meeting at a local supermarket at which Giffords and constituents were gathering.

We saw it at nearby Virginia Tech on April 16, 2007, when Seung-Hui Cho took the lives of 32 people; and we saw it at Sandy Hook Elementary School in December of 2012, when 20-year-old Adam Lanza ended the lives of 20 children and seven adults after taking his own mother's life and then his own.

How many more calls for attention--for help?--does America need to hear?

The killing of two Capitol Police Officers over a decade ago, here in our Capitol, was perpetrated by a man who had been diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic who was off his medication, alienated from his family and who got access to a gun.

Congress should be deeply concerned that civilians, as well as our brave men and women who serve or who have served in our Armed Forces, are not receiving the medical treatment required for diagnosing debilitating mental illness and trying to treat it better. An annual Department of Defense report on suicide has shown a precipitous increase in military suicides over the course of the last 5 years. In 2012, there were 349 suicides by military men and women from all branches of the Armed Forces. That is more than all the combat deaths that same year in Afghanistan. This is an epidemic and requires more attention and investment, including the BRAIN Initiative put forward by the President.

In sum, the common denominator with many of these mass shootings is a mentally ill individual with access to deadly weapons who has not been treated properly or, many times, whose mental illness has not even been evaluated. America must address these deficiencies for the benefit of our entire society. We must accelerate research to unlock the mysteries of the human brain.

Mr. Speaker, the only question is: Do America's leaders on behalf of the American people have the courage and vision to embark on a serious national conversation about mental health and mental illness?

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