The U.S. is spending more on mental disorders than on any other kind of health problems, reports HealthAffairs. It spent, for example, $2o1 billion in 2013, the last year that full data were available for the study.

A study there by Charles Roehrig, Ph.D., which covers 1996–2013, updates a 2009 Health Affairs study that used the same methodology and covered the period 1996–2005. ” This year’s study highlights the low rate of increase in spending on heart conditions and cerebrovascular disease during this period, with the slow spending growth  explained by reductions in smoking and better control of such risk factors such as hypertension and hyperlipidemia, credited with declining death rates for these conditions.”

But Dr. Roehrig noted that “reductions in deaths from heart conditions and cerebrovascular disease are likely to drive spending on mental disorders even higher, as more people survive to older ages — when mental disorders, such as dementia, become more prevalent.”