In favour of institutional care of the mentally ill
Do reader reactions signal a shift in Canadian public opinion?
When the Globe and Mail publishes My Toronto transit ride shows why it’s not wrong to consider involuntary care for the mentally ill, it must be a sign that public opinion is shifting. Columnist Marcus Gee describes his experience on a Toronto streetcare to make the case for institutionalisation of the severely addicted and mentally ill:
When I got on, a guy was lying passed out or asleep on the long bench at the back, taking up all the seats. A barefoot man in dirty clothes was walking up and down the aisle. At Yonge Street, just in front of the Eaton Centre, he got off and meandered unsteadily through the midday crowd.
Three others got on. One was a big guy in sweats and a hoodie. He took a seat, talking incoherently to no one in particular. Every few words was a curse. Another was a skinny guy with tangled hair who was dragging a beat-up rolling suitcase and muttering to himself in Spanish. The third was a middle-aged woman in jean shorts and red slippers in the shape of rabbits. She was playing music on a portable speaker, turned up high, and shouting at some invisible enemy.
If the comments section is any indication, consensus opinion is heavily in support of institutional care. Several threads emerge among the 250 reader reactions, quoted below:
Institutional care is a compassionate response
The overriding value should be to preserve the dignity of the human person. That might mean not allowing someone, due to addiction or mental illness, to inflict indignity upon themselves
Involuntary care is the only means to address some situations. And it seems to me that people, who don't have the direct experience of involvement with deeply deranged, psychotic people such as our family member, cannot have an informed opinion on this topic. Fourteen years of 911, street, evictions, massive damage to property, brutal beatings, repeating overdoses, deranged beliefs, hallucinations … it never stops
Some would say, like I am saying, that's it's not civilized to let people die in the streets when there's another option. That option is involuntary treatment. They may not be happy, being confined and denied their drug of choice, but they will be alive and relatively well, and their families will be able to visit them instead of a gravestone.
I support involuntary care where those with drug and homeless issues can get rehab and have their lives straightened around, until such point they are functioning individuals again. Some may call it tough love, but it works.
Allowing these poor people to live their lives without guardrails is akin to giving total decision-making autonomy to an eight-year-old... Or, conversely, to an elderly person with dementia.
The public is fed up with unsafe streets, parks and transit
We have lost sight of the fact that creating an unsafe environment in on public spaces and transit will ultimately have extremely negative effects on our society. There seems to be a lot of concern about the offenders (many of us consider drug use as a criminal offense). No one seems to care about the larger effects this activity is having on the rest if us.
In Victoria, we have an increasing number of these people who should be detained but are not and so we have to endure the mess, the sidewalk tents, needles, vomit, disregard for citizens, violence and the utter degradation of all the surrounding areas where they increasingly gather like gangs in the night.
Closing mental hospitals was a mistake
Institutions were closed decades ago and the mentally ill were "freed" to live in the community. The basic supports that they needed to do this were never provided and we've been in a death spiral for decades.
In the 1970s the largest hospitals were often psychiatric hospitals with bed counts of 1000 not being uncommon. These hospitals were shuttered in the late 70s and 80s. Falling to the mantra of community-based care, and the fallacy that it would be cheaper.
I remember the downtown becoming populated with "disturbed" people immediately after psychiatric hospitals started closing. Now we're talking about opening them up again.
Many are giving up on public transit
And you wonder why people don’t use public transit? Why would you take the risk?
This is one reason that people won't use public transport, preferring their cars and enduring heavy traffic, high gas prices, fumes, etc.
Perhaps part of the solution to the mental health, addiction and homelessness problem would be to redirect funds away from transit towards institutional care for those that require it.
In this month’s provincial election in British Columbia, John Rustad’s Conservative party is campaigning on new laws to allow for involuntary care of people suffering from severe addiction. It is hoped that the winds of change blow eastward over the Rockies.