We settled it years ago, closed asylums, so many,
those Dickensian places, exposed, closed, patients,
inmates released into the world, often just left off
with few plans and fewer places to go; streets are
never enough; homeless they haunt us, we jail them,
fill emergency rooms with them, with no beds for
them; instead of doctors we give them the police,
instead of treatment, we jail them, instead of solutions
we get statistics, how many of the homeless, how
many crimes, how many dollars we spend to no end,
and we’re getting to know that solutions are never
as easy as they seem to be.
This rings so true. I think the closing of too many mental hospitals was wrong. These people need to be cared for if they can not care for themselves. Some have no one or nowhere to go. I hate to think they are out there, on the streets, without anyone to care whether they live or die. Getting no medications or treatments that would help them live a better life. My mother had to go to a mental hospital and they helped her greatly.. She was bipolar and was given electric shock treatments that cured her for 5O years. Late in her life her condition returned and she was treated again with good results. I believe all mentally ill persons should be treated and helped, not put on the streets.
Thank you for sharing this, Julia. Sincerely, Guy.