Mentally Ill Should Not Go To Prison

Words: 949
Pages: 4

Today our largest mental hospitals are our local prisons. A few decades ago we started a new type of segregation. This segregation is hidden from most of the population and lives behind the prison walls. This segregation is known as the segregation of the sick. Instead of putting a mentally ill person in a safe environment to get further treatment, we throw them in a prison and hope for the best. The mentally ill should be placed in a mental health facility instead of going to prison. Mentally ill shouldn’t go to prison because because the safety for themselves and others are being jeopardized, they won’t receive proper treatment plans, and it isn’t cost efficient.

Recently, Hillary Clinton made a worldwide statement about the imprisonment issues in the United States. "It's a stark fact that the United States has less than 5 percent of the world's population, yet we have almost 25 percent of the world's total prison population. The numbers today are much higher than they were 30, 40 years ago, despite the fact that crime is at historic lows" (Lee). The sad truth behind the rising numbers in the prison population is due to the failure to
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In any prison it isn’t unusual to find it to be damp, dark, and sad place. These conditions are an easy trigger for anyone, especially for someone who doesn’t know how to cope properly. For someone who is already mentally ill, these conditions will set them off at a much quicker rate. Another problem leading up to safety hazards is the amount of inmates. Today, overcrowding in prison cells are normal. As the inmate number increases, the chance for someone to get hurt also increases. The amount of people can easily make a mentally ill inmate anxious. Once a person is anxious they begin to shut down. Shutting down can make someone harm themselves or another