Mental Health Crisis Office

Mostly in ways that had no relationship to doing the actual work!

Excellent idea, Leopold! I will drive to D.C. immediately!

Jails and prisons have turned into what used to be crisis services and mental hospitals. This is "saving money." Yet, mental health workers are expected to provide the same services without the backup and resources of public funding. For the most part, they soldier on and do provide the services, but at increased risk of more homeless clients, more ER visits, massive staff burnout,* staff turnover and early retirement (a-hem!). It will get much, much worse if/when Speaker of the House Paul Ryan gets his way with our medical system.

This is all happening because Americans, as a rule, don't care about mental illness. They just don't want to see it on the streets.

*Including emergency room and jail staff!

It's the same in much of the so-called civilized world I think. And yet in countries such as Spain, there seems to be more of a family-orientated culture (even now) and families seem more willing to shoulder much of the burden of mental illness withing the family as well as accepting that the elderly should be cared for at home for as long as possible too. But even here the traditional family structure is starting to fail, so I doubt that the current state of affairs can last much longer, sadly.