Violence and the Mentally Ill
On NPR this morning a woman was explaining her experiences with her mentally ill bi-polar brother, and how she fears that since he always stops taking his medicine he will eventually hurt someone or himself. She thinks a national registry will help keep up with the location of the mentally ill so that they will get their medicine.
We already have a national registry of a sort- Social Insecurity. I do not see how writing things about a person on a peice of paper is going to help. I doubt that mentally ill persons are going to check in with the authorities every time they move if they don't take their medicine. This is a very sad story. There must be a better way. I don't think we really know how to handle the situation without using force against the mentally ill and violating their rights.
Often times when the mentally ill get violent, the police don't know how to handle the situation either.
Psychology Today has a great article, Are the Mentally Ill Really Violent? exploring the issue of violence by the mentally ill. According to the article, violence is rare among the mentally ill. If a mentally ill person resorts to violence, the patient more than likely is depressed, has been exposed to violence in the past, or is abusing drugs.
Civil liberties groups take issue with laws that force the mentally ill to seek treatment.The article concludes that, "public policy may best be served if clinicians focus more intently on those most likely to be violent, instead of wasting their efforts on more harmless individuals." How we can do this is another question.
8:53:04 AM
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