XPost: alt.california, alt.politics.republicans, alt.fan.rush-limbaugh
XPost: sac.politics
From: barackobama@thinkprogress.org

After patients were released from mental hospitals, there wasn’t
always a place for them to go. On this week’s episode, we
explore if deinstitutionalization was a factor in the Bay Area’s
homeless crisis. Bay Curious is a new podcast from KQED that’s
all about answering your questions about the Bay Area.

Earlier this year, we asked for your questions on homelessness.
More than 1,300 of you responded and we answered many of your
questions in our first round of reporting.

There was one topic that kept coming up again and again as we
sorted your questions. This week on the podcast, we answer
listener Debbie Ow’s question:

“Is the situation as bad as it is because of the closure of
mental health facilities in our state?”

Listen to the podcast for the answer.

Deinstitutionalization: A History
1833 Worcester State Hospital opens in Massachusetts as the
first mental hospital fully supported by state funds.

1860 Twenty-eight of the 33 existing U.S. states have state
psychiatric hospitals.

1939-1945 During World War II conscientious objectors enter
state psychiatric hospitals to replace doctors who were sent
away for the war effort.

1946 Life Magazine publishes photos depicting the horrors inside
the hospitals.

1954 Chlorpromazine, marketed as Thorazine, is approved by the
Food and Drug Administration. It’s the first anti-psychotic drug
widely used to treat the symptoms of mental illness. For many,
it brought hope that some patients could live among the
community.

1955 The number of patients inside public mental hospitals
nationwide peaks at 560,000.

1959 The number of patients in California state mental hospitals
peaks at 37,000.

1963 President John F. Kennedy signs the Community Mental Health
Act. This pushes the responsibility of mentally ill patients
from the state toward the federal government. JFK wanted to
create a network of community mental health centers where
mentally ill people could live in the community while receiving
care. JFK could have been inspired to act because his younger
sister, Rosemary, was mentally disabled, received a lobotomy and
spent her life hidden away.

Less than a month after signing the new legislation, JFK is
assassinated. He doesn’t see the plan through. The community
mental health centers never receive stable funding, and even 15
years later less than half the promised centers are built.

1965 The U.S. Congress establishes Medicaid and Medicare.
Mentally disabled people living in the community are eligible
for benefits but those in psychiatric hospitals are excluded. By
encouraging patients to be discharged, state legislators could
shift the cost of care for mentally ill patients to the federal
government.

1967 Ronald Reagan is elected governor of California. At this
point, the number of patients in state hospitals had fallen to
22,000, and the Reagan administration uses the decline as a
reason to make cuts to the Department of Mental Hygiene. They
cut 2,600 jobs and 10 percent of the budget despite reports
showing that hospitals were already below recommended staffing
levels.

1967 Reagan signs the Lanterman-Petris-Short Act and ends the
practice of institutionalizing patients against their will, or
for indefinite amounts of time. This law is regarded by some as
a “patient’s bill of rights”. Sadly, the care outside state
hospitals was inadequate. The year after the law goes into
effect, a study shows the number of mentally ill people entering
San Mateo’s criminal justice system doubles.

1969 Reagan reverses earlier budget cuts. He increases spending
on the Department of Mental Hygiene by a record $28 million.

1973 The number of patients in California State mental hospitals
falls to 7,000.

1980 President Jimmy Carter signs the Mental Health Systems Act
to improve on Kennedy’s dream.

1981 President Reagan repeals Carter’s legislation with the
Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act. This pushes the
responsibility of mentally ill patients back to the states. The
legislation creates block grants for the states, but federal
spending on mental illness declines.

2004 The U.S. Department of Justice estimates that 10 percent of
state prisoners have symptoms that meet criteria for a psychotic
disorder.

2015 In the San Francisco Homeless Count, 55 percent of people
experiencing chronic homelessness report they have emotional or
psychiatric conditions.

https://ww2.kqed.org/news/2016/12/08/did-the-emptying-of-mental- hospitals-contribute-to-homelessness-here/

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: www.darkrealms.ca (1:229/2)