The potters herald. [volume] (East Liverpool, Ohio) 1899-1982, 1949-03-17
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I've been reading good bit late
ly about mental health and state
hospitals for the mentally i'll. It's
rough going.
One fact stands out very clear in
the whole picture. Practically all
disqualification for the mentally i'll
is state disqualification. Where
there are private institutions they
are for the small and select class
of wealthy.
From the very beginnings of re-
cognition of the fact that mental
illness is illness and not crime, the
principle of state obligation has
been accepted and applied.
The horror of the whole thing is
in the fact that nowhere is there
enough.
In some cases the quality is
good, but the quantity is pitifully
lacking. In others both quantity
and quality are in short supply.
Here is a field of human misery
in which the public conscience
needs a terrific jolting. 1t would
help if everyone realized that "you
could be next.
X \
The day when a brutal superin-
tendent could be made the scape-
goat has gone.
There isn't too much fault to be
found with those who run the insti-
tutions.
There is all the fault in the
world to be found with a public
that doesn't demand that there be
money enough for the space and
the equipment needed for the care
of these thousands upon thousands
of sick people.
There is plenty of fault to be
found with legislators who don't
vote the money and who don't tell
their constituents why it is needed.
There is plenty of fault, too, to
be found with newspapers who
don't take up the cause and ham
mer away until people understand.
Many states spend more on their
prisoners, per prisoner, than they
spend for the care of their mental
ly i'll, per case.
In almost every hospital in this
category there are too few doctors,
too few nurses, too few attendants
and too little of almost everything.
1t shouldn't be so.
X X x
Unions could make a great con-
tribution to social betterment by
taking up the cause of the mental
ly i'll.
We have passed the day when
we thought in terms of insanity.
We think now in terms of illness
and a lot of it can be cured.
Actually the insane asylum has
gone the way of the pest house.
The pest house has given way to
isolation wards for contagious
diseases and the insane asylum has
given way to hospitals.
The best hospitals for mentally
i'll don't even restrain patients any
more. That is, the straight jacket,
the camisole and the straps are for
museum display only. But that is
true only where there is adequate
personnel of proper caliber.
Another idea that is passed is
that of putting mental hospital
in some out of the way place, as
Georgia has done and as Florida
has done. Mental hospitals, like
others, need to be near population
centers, for access to outside medi-
cal circles and to medical schools,
as well as to relatives of patients.
\ X X
There is vast new understand
ing of the needs, but it is not yet
a broad, public understanding.
Unions pay a lot of attention to
physical health; why do they not
pay equal attention to mental
health? Look! there are as many
mentally i'll at this hour in the
United States as there are ply
sically ill and as many hospital
beds are in use for the one class as
for the other.
But the physically ill get the
latest and best; the mentally ill
largely still lurk in the shadow.
How long before those unions
that are trying to pioneer in health
work wake up and discover the
field of great neglect?
How long, too, before they dis
cover the great bond between men
tai illness and much of our ply
steal illness =?
No field holds out more
lramatic invitation to sound effort
n the field of saving human beings |
rom wreckage and slow dissolu- /
ion. Why the continued neglect?
Plane Stewards Win Pay Hike