No. That way lies One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest.
Build easily accessible, tolerable, humane mental health treatment facilities and capacity every where. Public mental health care the same quality as private, insured care. Indistinguishable in quality and appeal.
IIRC the majority of the characters on the ward were there voluntarily.
The problem is that mentally ill people don’t always realise they need help. Cody Balmer’s family were desperately trying to get him help, but no one was legally allowed to do anything. He could have killed a whole family, and now he’ll be involuntarily confined for a long time, in jail. It’s an extreme example, but plenty of people ruin their lives, harm their families, end up on the street, and no one can do anything unless they are willing and able to stick with treatment voluntarily - and many can’t.
Involuntary treatment is a violation of human rights.
Indeed, but even the notion of “voluntary” is tricky, when it comes to mental health. There are plenty of people who, when they’re on their meds, prefer to stay on their meds, and when they’re off them, prefer to stay off them. Which one is the person’s true preference?
It’s legal if the person is a danger to themself or others. That’s not the only possible standard we could use as a society. If the person isn’t in their right mind and it’s in their best interests, is it wrong in principle to force them to get treatment? The main argument seems to be that this power might be abused.
Yes
Not in their right mind according to whose mind? In their best interests’ according to who?
Yes.
The first two conditions that come to mind, where the illness itself causes people to not know anything is wrong with them, are frontotemporal dementia and schizophrenia. People with schizophrenia (which I believe ranks up there with bipolar disorder as the worst thing that can happen to a person and their family, and no, this doesn’t minimize anything else) have, if you will, warped thinking, and no matter how many times they’re told otherwise, or even in some way believe it themselves, they believe that the treatment is CAUSING their disorder, not relieving it, and that’s why compliance in schizophrenics is so challenging.
Many drugs have been adapted into slow-release preparations, requiring an injection, say, once a week or once a month, but they only work if the person comes in to get them.