It’s a lengthy article. Please read first before commenting…
The question now is not, “What happened to the asylums?” but “What replaced them?” Following the mass closure of state hospitals and the establishment of a legal regime that dramatically restricted involuntary commitments, we have created an “invisible asylum” composed of three primary institutions: the street, the jail, and the emergency room. In slaying the old monster of the state asylums, we created a new monster in its shadow: one that maintains the appearance of freedom but condemns a large population of the mentally ill to a life of misery.
I haven’t made up my mind, but I see this as an early truth in the article.
In the name of compassion, we have built a system that may be even crueler than what came before.
Idk. Asylums were pretty messed up and a massive failure.
I supposed you can argue we know much more about mental health and disorders but there would need to be massive amounts of good regulations and oversight.
Yup. A guy driving over a parade of parents and kids should never ever have been let out on the streets with the list of felonious tomfuckery he had. Fuck his rights.
We don’t even have enough workers to staff nursing homes and hospitals here, let alone asylums. People are running from the health care industry.
Another Albany, NY news item over the weekend – no licensed nursing staff reported to work at a nursing home, so as a result no resident could receive medication. There were five ambulances there when the story broke and I haven’t heard how many residents were actually harmed as a result, if any. But no staff? And the institution’s Facebook page has photos from a gumbo party they gave staff a week or two ago to celebrate the place being removed from the state “deficiencies” list.
But I can say for sure nursing homes are shit in the US now. We sprung my mother from one a month or so ago (where she had been admitted for “rehabilitation” after a hospital stay) when she was not given medication (and she takes many) for over 24 hours. We had to literally show up and bully our way in as they were using COVID restrictions to keep family out. Then the place claimed that if we took her out, she would get “nothing”. They refused to release her medications list or transfer prescriptions to her pharmacy. A real class act. Fortunately my 92-year-old mother is rather good with a computer, despite being legally blind and mostly deaf. We put in a complaint and…crickets. Of course.
Given the economic shift, there may soon be a demand side need.
And I saw that story as well. Not sure how the gumbo party fits in. I know we’re exhausted and frazzled. I can only imagine what nursing home staff are feeling after two years of chaos.
Hope your mom is feeling better after being sprung.
What do “his rights” have to do with not being punished for his crimes? Is it a criminal’s “right” to be let loose again and again as he escalates his crimes?
You should really talk to someone about your Elon fixation. I mean— Not me. Please god, not me, but someone. Else. Someone else. I need to be clear on that.
