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DJ Jaffe joins Stephen Eide and Howard Husock to discuss severe mental illness and the deficiencies in mental-health services in New York City and across the country.
DJ Jaffe is the author of an important new book, Insane Consequences: How the Mental Health Industry Fails the Mentally Ill. He is executive director of Mental Illness Policy Org., a nonpartisan think tank that creates detailed policy analysis for legislators, the media, and advocates.
Stephen Eide is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute and author of a recent report, “Assisted Outpatient Treatment in New York State: The Case for Making Kendra’s Law Permanent.” His story in the Spring 2017 issue of City Journal, “Failure to Thrive,” dissects New York City mayor Bill de Blasio’s signature mental health initiative, ThriveNYC.
Howard Husock is vice president for research and publications at the Manhattan Institute and a City Journal contributing editor. His story in the spring 2017 issue, “Dreams of My Uncle,” tells the story of his schizophrenic great-uncle, who spent most of his 92 years in Ohio mental hospitals.
City Journal is a magazine of urban affairs, published by the Manhattan Institute.
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I’m glad to hear common sense interviews like this. Serious mental illness is an enormous problem that many in government try to ignore.
I was glad to hear this episode (which I listened to back when it came out). The Portland, OR, train stabber who killed two men made me think of this again. To me, the guy in Portland is so clearly mentally ill. It’s terrible that people like him don’t get the help the need to prevent these types of things happening. It is not “humane” to let a severely mentally ill person wander the street. Would we let an Alzheimer’s patient check themselves out of the hospital because of their “right” to wander around in their underwear? (I hope not.) Most mentally ill people are not violent, and even most of the violent ones don’t kill other people, especially not strangers. Usually the people who get hurt are the family members who have been trying for years to get help for their loved one but have been thwarted at every step by careless do-gooder civil-liberties types.