You might be curious regarding why I have written this case history on the mental health movement from 1960 to 1980. The principal reason was to gain a better understanding regarding why the movement, which succeeded in helping so many people troubled by mental illness but who were not seriously mentally ill, failed for the most part to aid those who were seriously mentally ill. The second reason for writing the piece was my interest in mental illness resulting from my own occasional battle with depression.
 
I was an active participant in the citizen’s mental health movement during the 1960’s and 70’s and was caught up, along with others in the movement, with the idea that all mental illness, including that which was serious, was going to be effectively treated in community mental health centers. State mental hospitals would be emptied or greatly downsized and the centers, along with the new medications such as thorazine, promised a revolution in the treatment of all mental illness, including those who were seriously ill.
 
Despite the promise of adequate treatment for all who were mentally ill, and the success in providing treatment for many thousands, the failure of the movement to provide treatment for seriously mentally ill people seems clearly evident. It is estimated that approximately 284,000 adults with serious mental illness are incarcerated in jails or prisons each year. It is further estimated that 25% of the hundreds of thousands of people living on the streets are mentally ill. Moreover, states are spending thirty percent less today than they were in 1955 when they began to close state mental hospitals in favor of community care.
 
So the reason for writing the piece was to gain greater understanding of the forces that shaped the mental health movement including government, especially the federal government, as well as citizen groups, and professional organizations. Further, to was to understand how it was that seriously mentally ill persons were for the most part, and no doubt unintentionally, left out by these same forces.
 
Bob Smucker
April 2007