"Monarch, which contracted with Sandhills to provide mental health services in Greensboro, is not offering financial assistance with psych meds. Previously, Guilford Center offered meds at lower prices and provided free meds for homeless people (and maybe others, as well -- it was based on income).Are our County Commissioners going to wait until someone goes off and hurts somebody before addressing this problem? Probably.
Our StreetWatch team is finding that some homeless people are now going without medicine for bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, PTSD, depression and other mental illnesses that can result in them harming themselves or others, and/or engaging in other criminal behavior. This is a serious problem. From a cost/benefit perspective, it's less expensive to subsidize meds than to pay for jail beds. And it's inhumane to allow mentally ill people to suffer because they're poor."
UPDATE: News & Record's Joe Killian reports, Jail trying to cope with mentally ill
We're well past the point of someone going off and hurting someone as a result of not getting the care they might have gotten when mental health care was better funded in the county.
ReplyDeleteAnd as my story from this weekend illustrates, the county commissioners are very unlikely to do anything even after the next one.
There have been multiple deaths at the county jail under the watch of Prison Health Services, the private low-bid contractor the commissioners have not only retained but praised.
Doing another story that goes deeper into that, though.
Yes, thanks for the work you are doing. Looking forward to your next report.
ReplyDeleteAmazing what an e-mail prompt can accomplish.
ReplyDeleteDecember.
ReplyDelete