It is estimated that there are a little over 300,000 mentally ill offenders in American prisons today. It is not acceptable, and needs to fix its current system. America saw a huge rise in prison population after the abolishment of psychiatric hospitals in the late 1960’s. Are prisons however, a better solution than psychiatric wards?
The answer to that question is NO. With an already overcrowded prison population that will reach over 2 million housed offenders by the year 2013, it is not a good idea to continue to imprison the mentally ill. It is doing nothing but contributing to the growing number of problems that prisons across the United States face. While some inmates have the capability of changing and molding into becoming model citizens, I think it takes a much deeper and better understanding than being a correctional officer to take care of the mentally ill. These correctional officers and faculty of the prison institutions are not trained psychiatrist. With some prisons only having one psychiatrist on duty it is very hard to maintain the accommodations that these mentally ill patients need.
Psychiatric hospitals need to be reopened and used better than before. It was the system its self that failed in the 1960’s not the idea of having mentally ill hospitals. If we administrate a more humane type of hospital and do not abuse our mentally ill prisoners at these institutions I believe it would be the best idea for housing the mentally ill criminal offenders. We have to remember that it is not the offenders fault for suffering from such diseases and it is our job as society to make sure we seek proper help for these offenders.
By Lucas Hart
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