- In the 19th century, many mentally ill patients were
locked up in their homes by families embarrassed by their conduct and ignorant
about the illness. But with more medical knowledge about the nature of
mental illness, this was seen as barbaric and mental hospitals were created
to care for these patients.
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- As problems surfaced with these mental hospitals in the
latter half of the 20th century, many were closed with the understanding
that community treatment facilities would be put in place for their former
patients. But these community-based services were never adequately funded
so today instead of locking our mentally ill up in our homes, it seems
we have opted to lock them in prisons and jails.
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- Indeed, according to a recent study by Human Rights Watch,
one in six U.S. prisoners is mentally ill. In fact, there are three times
more mentally ill persons in U.S. prisons than in mental health hospitals.
And those numbers do not include mentally ill persons who are in jails
or juvenile detention facilities. "Prisons have become the nation's
primary mental health facilities," said Jamie Fellner, director of
Human Rights Watch's U.S. program. They estimate that there are between
200,000 and 300,000 mentally ill prisoners in U.S. prisons. Moreover, the
rate of mental illness in our nation's prison population is three times
higher than in the general population.
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- The fact that so many mentally ill persons are incarcerated
can be traced directly to our underfunded, disorganized and fragmented
community mental health services. When state and local governments shut
down the large mental health facilities in the latter part of the 20th
century, many people with mental illness, especially those with substance
abuse problems and without homes or health insurance were left without
any mental health services. "Unless you are wealthy, it can be next
to impossible to receive mental health services in the community,"
said Fellner, adding, "many prisoners might never have ended up behind
bars if publicly funded treatment had been available." An advisory
commission appointed by President Bush recently reported that the U.S.
mental health system is "in shambles."
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- The Human Rights Watch report is based on two years of
research and hundreds of interviews with prisoners, corrections officials,
mental health experts and attorneys. It tells of prisoners who rant, rave,
babble incoherently, talk with invisible companions, beat their heads against
cell walls, cover themselves with feces, mutilate themselves and attempt
suicide. In many instances these prisoners find it difficult, if not impossible,
to follow prison rules and then are punished for their behavior.
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- Moreover, corrections officials are being required to
provide mental health facilities which they just are not equipped to do.
Many patients need medication on a regular basis, which prison hospitals
or guards are not able to provide, thus ensuring that mentally ill prisoners
will deteriorate while they are incarcerated. Although many state prison
mental health services have improved over the past two decades, the alarming
rise in the number of mentally ill prisoners at the same time as decreasing
state budgets has meant that the much-needed services for these prisoners
often have not been available. As a result, untrained staff have sometimes
escalated confrontations with mentally ill prisoners and these prisoners
can accumulate extensive disciplinary records resulting in them being put
into isolated, windowless segregation cells. In other instances, other
prisoners have abused or attacked them.
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- The treatment of mentally ill prisoners is a part of
international human rights laws and standards. Thus, Human Rights Watch
points out that if the U.S. abided by such standards, the plight of American
mentally ill prisoners would improve dramatically. In addition, such prisoners
are protected under the Eighth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which
prohibits cruel and unusual punishment.
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- Now federal legislation is being proposed by Senator
Mike DeWine (R-OH) and Congressman Ted Strickland (D-OH) which would provide
federal grants to divert mentally ill offenders into treatment programs
rather than jail or prison and to improve the quality of mental health
services inside our prisons and jails. Called the Mentally Ill Offender
Treatment and Crime Reduction Act, it begins to address some of the problems
highlighted in the Human Rights Watch report.
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- Our nation's prisons were never designed to be our primary
mental health facility. Unless we do something about this, we are no better
than our 19th century ancestors who locked up their mentally ill in their
attics and basements and threw away the key. In fact, we are worse because
we better understand the nature of mental illness. We are worse because
we have chosen to incarcerate our mentally ill and thereby don't have to
care for these mentally ill persons ourselves.
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- http://news.pacificnews.org/news/view_article.html?article
_id=bcae4d45384c5094c8c6e91c3568cea8
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