I have written about the need for involuntary treatment for incapacitating mental illness and substance addiction more times than I can easily count. You've probably tired of my seeming obsession with the subject. Yet here it comes again.
Howard Husock, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, writes for the New York Post on this very subject. Key thoughts:The Department of Housing and Urban Development found that at least 25 percent of the US homeless, or 140,000 people, were seriously mentally ill; 45 percent suffered from mental illness of some kind. Serious mental illness isn’t garden-variety anxiety or melancholy.
The National Coalition for the Homeless has found that 38 percent of homeless people are alcohol-dependent, while 26 percent are dependent on other harmful chemicals.
We don’t leave those suffering from most ailments to forage for food from garbage cans, as many homeless must. We provide treatment, including through Medicare and Medicaid. Yet we pretend that the mentally ill, addicted souls on our streets just need more government housing.
Yes, by all means, let’s help the homeless — and get them off the street, where they pose a public-health and public-safety hazard to themselves and others. But for God’s sake, let’s get them the treatment they need.
Adding those numbers, up to 89% of the homeless are "seriously mentally ill" or addicted. Allowing for a degree of overlap, that still qualifies as darned near all. The remaining few can use a hand up.
