![]() ![]() Since 1851, The New York Times has published thousands of obituaries: of heads of state, opera singers, the inventor of Stove Top stuffing and the namer of the Slinky. To look back at the obituary archives can, therefore, be a stark lesson in how society valued various achievements and achievers. Yet who gets remembered - and how - inherently involves judgment. (4) This lack of insight coupled with the complexities of serious.Obituary writing is more about life than death: the last word, a testament to a human contribution. (3) In addition to the many debilitating symptoms of serious mental illness, many people also lack insight into the extent and effects of their symptoms lack of insight is neurologically based and is often a hallmark of serious mental illness. Serious mental illness affects approximately 9.6 million people in the United States, or about 4.1% of the population. But something tells me that the people locked up in San Quentin with a mental illness, and the people roving the hack alleys of skid row, are not singing "God Bless America." (2) "Civil libertarians say no-that it is our right to commit crimes that land us in prison, that it is our choice to be so ill that we prefer to forage through garbage and live on the streets, that it is our prerogative to let voices in our heads torment us into sleepless nights. "It must be remembered that for the person with severe mental illness who has no treatment the most dreaded of confinements can be the imprisonment inflicted by his own mind, which shuts reality out and subjects him to the torment of voices and images beyond our own powers to describe." (1) Recommendations: The Need for a Broader Interpretation of Gravely Disabled Commitment Standards Conclusion The Aftermath: Effects of Deinstitutionalization and the Dangerousness Standard VI. Public Perceptions About Mental Illness & Dangerousness V. The Role of Psychiatrists and Courts in Civil Commitment Proceedings IV. ![]() The History of Civil Commitment in the United States II. Courts and psychiatrists should recognize states' obligations to provide health care to people with mental illness by interpreting gravely disabled statutes to allow for commitment when an individual is unable to provide for her basic needs but does not pose a danger to herself. Continued perceptions of the link between mental illness and violence, coupled with the strict interpretation of commitment statutes based on states' parens patriae authority, have resulted in commitment standards that effectively commit people only when they are dangerous, which is often far past the point that they are in need of help. States' continued and primary use of dangerousness standard in civil commitment proceedings does not meet our obligations to people with serious mental illness. All people have certain rights to be free from unwanted medical treatment, but for people with serious mental illness, those civil liberties are an abstraction, safeguarded for them by a system that is not otherwise ensuring access to shelter and basic medical care. Yet in spite of these statutes, most psychiatrists and courts will not commit an individual until they are found to pose a danger to themselves or others. Almost every American state allows civil commitment upon a finding that a person, as a result of mental illness, is gravely disabled and unable to meet their basic needs for food and shelter. ![]()
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