Thursday, December 27, 2007
Jails and Prisons - The Mentally Ill and Overcrowding
Mental institutions are becoming scarce because of deinstitutionalization, so now many of the mentally ill are being handled by the criminals justice system. There are 283,800 inmates identified as having a mental illness. The mental illnesses are varied, ranging from severe depression to paranoid schizophrenia. These are identifiable mentally ill inmates who need medication, but who often do not receive it because of an overburdened prison and jail system. No one knows how many mentally ill go undetected through the system, or how many are mentally ill as a result of prison conditions. Suicide is the leading cause of death among inmates and more than half of the suicides are thought to be attributable to mental illness.
Because of the system's inability to handle the amount of prisoners it is forced to handle, many mentally ill people are siphoned in to jails or prisons instead of mental hospitals where they belong. Incarcerating the mentally ill is not a new phenomenon, it has been happening since the beginning of incapacitation, but with the resources and knowledge we now have at our disposal there is little excuse for our imprisonment of the psychologically handicapped. The lack of treatment for mentally ill inmates is tragic because mental disorders are highly treatable with a 60-80% success rate. It is possible that many of the mentally ill in prisons and jails could be treated, or stabilized, with current medications, but for that to happen, people, politicians, and judges would have to have a radical change of policy, ideology, and heart.
Because of the system's inability to handle the amount of prisoners it is forced to handle, many mentally ill people are siphoned in to jails or prisons instead of mental hospitals where they belong. Incarcerating the mentally ill is not a new phenomenon, it has been happening since the beginning of incapacitation, but with the resources and knowledge we now have at our disposal there is little excuse for our imprisonment of the psychologically handicapped. The lack of treatment for mentally ill inmates is tragic because mental disorders are highly treatable with a 60-80% success rate. It is possible that many of the mentally ill in prisons and jails could be treated, or stabilized, with current medications, but for that to happen, people, politicians, and judges would have to have a radical change of policy, ideology, and heart.
Labels: incarceration, mental-illness
