With state-run treatment centers and hospitals shuttered, prison is now the last resort for the mentally ill -- Rikers Island, the LA County Jail and Cook County Jail in Illinois housed the nation's largest treatment centers in 2011.
No one wants to send a 13-year-old genius who loves Harry Potter and his snuggle animal collection to jail. But our society, with its stigma on mental illness and its broken healthcare system, does not provide us with other options. Then another tortured soul shoots up a fast food restaurant. A mall. A kindergarten classroom. And we wring our hands and say, "Something must be done."
I agree that something must be done. It's time for a meaningful, nation-wide conversation about mental health. That's the only way our nation can ever truly heal.
God help me. God help Michael. God help us all.
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I am not certain that armchair quarterbacking with the advantage of hindsight will accomplish anything here. What the writer of this article is saying, is that too many of these kids - mostly boys, apparently - are falling thru' the cracks and More..
Yesterday I gave a blessing to a grandmother who was beaten up by her daughter. She thought she had a concussion, but with no health insurance, medical help is expensive. The grandmother tends her daughter's son and assists with her daughter More..
In the 1980s, under the Reagan administration, funding for mental health was severely cut. The gates and doors of the institutions opened and many who emotionally could not care for themselves were freed. Many were Vietnam vets who were severely More..