NYAPRS Note: Please take action today! Here’s a letter that our Recovery Now coalition sent last week. I’ll be in Washington today to advocate for recovery in the community rather than an increase in institutional beds. More later this week.
To the Editor:
Christine Montross’s proposal in “The Modern Asylum” (Op-Ed, Feb. 18) would set us back decades. Montross urges a return to the days when we locked up people with psychiatric disabilities and people with intellectual disabilities for life. But there was a reason the field moved away from this idea years ago. It didn’t work. There is little evidence that long-term institutionalization offers effective treatment. And it took away people’s most basic freedoms. In contrast, community-based services such as supported housing, mobile crisis, and peer support have decades of proven effectiveness and offer people with the most serious conditions much better lives.
Montross correctly identifies problems caused by the failure to fund sufficient community-based services. But the solution is not to go back to the same failed policies of the past but rather to expand the community services that we know work. Let’s promote recovery, not lifelong dependence.
Harvey Rosenthal, Recovery Now! Campaign, executive director, New York Association of Psychiatric Rehabilitation Services, Albany, NY
The Recovery Now! Campaign is a coalition advancing successful strategies to improve the quality of mental health care, promoting recovery for all Americans affected by mental health conditions. Information about the campaign may be found at http://www.mentalhealthrecoverynow.org/
NYAPRS Note: These are indeed very challenging times as articles have appeared in the last few weeks in both the New York Times (“The Modern Asylum” http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/18/opinion/the-modern-asylum.html) and Time Magazine (“Should Mentally Ill People Be Forced Into Treatment?” http://time.com/3716426/mental-illness-treatment-cost/) espousing a return to institutions and a rise in the use of involuntary community treatment.
Our community must respond TODAY! Write Time Magazine at http://ideas.time.com/submit-a-letter/ and the Times at http://www.nytimes.com/content/help/site/editorial/letters/letters.html!
See below for more details. Thanks in advance for standing up for recovery in the community for all!