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Will Portugal Copy Our Mistakes?

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 The advocacy group Encontrar+SE invited me to Porto, Portugal recently to speak about the closing of our state mental hospitals here in the U.S. This was my third overseas trip, having gone to Iceland and Brazil last year.  

Founded in 2006, Encontrar+SE   is the creation of Filipa Palha, a psychologist, university professor, and determined mental health activist who is trying to make Portuguese health officials accountable.

The government there has announced plans to close all of the nation’s mental hospitals, but it has not allocated any money nor taken any steps to create community-based mental health services.

Sound familiar?

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NAMI Joins In Correcting NPR’s CEO

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Michael Fitzpatrick, the executive director of the National Alliance on Mental Illness, has joined me in complaining about an offensive remark that Vivian Schiller, the CEO and President of National Public Radio, said after firing Juan Williams. 
The day after I wrote on my blog about Schiller’s offensive comment, Mike fired off a letter to NPR and wrote a blog of his own posted on NAMI’s webpage chastising Schiller and asking NAMI members to write letters of complaint about her stigmatizing comment.

Before You Vote, Question Candidates

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Bob Carolla at the National Alliance on Mental Illness has been tirelessly lobbying editors, bloggers, and columnists to ask candidates in the upcoming November elections about the need for mental health reforms. Because of the recession, many states are cutting budgets and mental health funding often is an easy target.

We need to stop that from happening. 

Carolla and NAMI are wisely pointing out that cutting the budgets for mental health programs is counter-productive, especially when those cuts lead to persons with chronic illnesses ending up in jails and prisons because of a lack of adequate community services.

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Part Two – The Power of Hurtful and Helpful Words

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Words.  They matter.

When I was doing research inside the U.S. Penitentiary in Leavenworth, Kansas, for my book about everyday life inside a maximum security prison, I learned to select my words very carefully.

 This is because I was in a prison where what you said or didn’t say might get you stabbed. 

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Part One: Hurtful Words -Prejudice, NPR, and Fox TV

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 Juan Williams and I both worked at The Washington Post at the same time and have remained friendly ever since, so I was very interested in the media melodrama that unfolded last week when National Public Radio fired him.  

NPR CEO Vivian Schiller accused Juan of violating the radio network’s journalistic standards after he said on Fox Television’s “The O’Reilly Factor” that he got nervous when he was in an airport and saw people in Muslim garb.

His firing caused a flurry of accusations. Muslim groups accused Juan of being prejudice – a charge he denied. Bill O’Reilly accused NPR of dumping Juan because he had become a familiar face on the conservative Fox network — thereby irritating liberals. And everyone from Sarah Palin to NPR’s ombudsman chimed in.

Meanwhile, a chilling statement by Schiller was largely overlooked.

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CIT Returns to Fairfax County!

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Great news for those of us who live in Fairfax County, Virginia!
The Fairfax County Police Department just finished conducting a CIT class that was held from September 28th to October 1st and was attended by 49 officers.
In an earlier blog, I criticized the department for not including Crisis Intervention Team classes as part of the police force’s regular training program.    For those of you unfamiliar with CIT, it is a specially designed program that brings mental health professionals and law enforcement together to find ways to improve community mental health services.   
Sadly, police officers today deal with more persons with severe mental disorders than psychiatrists do. It only makes sense that the police undergo training that helps them identify someone who might be having a mental break and teaches them successful methods to deal with those persons, hopefully without force.