The House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee passed the Mental Health in Aviation Act of 2025 on Wednesday, a bill designed to reform how mental health issues are handled within the aviation industry.
The bipartisan legislation—introduced by Reps. Sean Casten, Rick Larsen, Tracey Mann and Pete Stauber—seeks to reduce stigma, improve mental health resources and provide nearly $40 million over the next three years to support these efforts.
Established in 2023, the Mental Health and Aviation Medical Clearances Rulemaking Committee (ARC) identified barriers such as stigma, fear, limited education and financial concerns that prevent pilots from seeking treatment. Its recommendations include expanding peer support programs, enhancing mental health education and creating non-punitive pathways for pilots to disclose mental health issues without jeopardizing their careers.
The bill has been supported by major aviation groups including AOPA and NBAA, both of which praised the House for advancing legislation that prioritizes pilot well-being and aviation safety. In a statement, NBAA President and CEO Ed Bolen said, “Addressing pilot mental health will improve the well-being of American aviators and the safety of the traveling public. We look forward to working with these members, the committee and lawmakers in the House and Senate to get this legislation signed into law.”
Supremely disappointed that Air Traffic Controllers arent included in this bill.
I dug into this a bit as I did not understand it fully.
The Mental Health in Aviation Act of 2025 is a bipartisan bill aimed at breaking the stigma that keeps pilots and air traffic controllers from getting mental health help. Many avoid treatment out of fear it’ll cost them their medical clearance, and their careers.
This bill tells the FAA to update its mental health rules within two years, making it safer for pilots and controllers to self-report and get treatment. It also pushes for faster, fairer medical certification, more approved medications, better AME training, and more authority for medical examiners.
It backs all this with nearly $14 million a year for more trained AMEs, plus $1.5 million a year for a national outreach campaign to reduce stigma. If all goes well, it could be law by year’s end.
The paradigm shift needed for efforts like this to enjoy fruition is as deeply ingrained in society as racism, anti-intellectualism or religious superiority.
We’ll need bold, fearless drivers and participants to show educators, the media, the Military - Joe six-pack, about generational bias and prejudice of human values concerning achievement and success in human striving.
This bill doesn’t stand a chance without fearless participants who can firmly Stand Against Stigma where it truly lives.
But if it can help at least light up a few pathways for pilots and others, let it be so.
Mental health (or a lack thereof) will be the major topic in the years and decades to come. Not sure if and how this slow-motion trainwreck is supposed to stop.
15 million annually for more AME’s and campaigns, to break a stigma that exists amongst the employers? That’s not logical. That’s crazy.
Thank you for this explanation, Raf.
I am not sure there are so many employers out there, who would apply a stigma to an employee who comes forward with emotional/ mental health issues. My guess would be, that admitting a issue and seeking help (from anyone in the boat) is better than eventually snapping and sinking the boat.
The FAA needs to take a long and hard look at the development-stage of chemical psychiatric treatments. The medications prescribed these days are multifold and we have diagnostic guidelines in the current DSM which have chemical answers to almost everything. Therapy… meeeh… not so smirky.
Unfortunately, this isn’t how “mental health” works or functions in society. Issues are on the rise, not stagnant and definitely not reducing.
I often wonder how we will fill our cockpits with pulsing humans if any and all psychiatric treatments depend on nothing but half-baked pharma to solve for X.
Well, when adults are mentally ill and have sex with minors, that “stigma” is permanent; they will never work again in many fields and they will forever be mapped on “offenders” community websites. It’s forever with them whether right or wrong.
Painting pilots with a broad brush of mental illness means that employers NEED to know precisely what the documented issue was. There is a big difference between a pilot that suffered from eating crayons when nervous and a pilot that attempted suicide. Employers need to know so they can decide who that they will put in the left seat (so any issues need to be well documented and available).
I applaud the committee for tackling a very difficult issue. Mental health issues effect virtually aspect of society. Maybe there should be different approval mechanisms for private pilots versus professional pilots carrying passengers. Just like it’s the patient who takes the ultimate risk for a given procedure, and not the doctor or hospital. It’s the passenger who takes the ultimate risk when flying, and not the FAA or pilot’s employer. I’d interested in hearing from AME’s and what they’ed be willing to sign-off on.