When a person with mental illness can’t get the help they need, the consequences can be dire. Advocates say decades of inadequate funding for services has chipped away at the entire mental health system, making it difficult for people to find the right treatments at the right time.
For some, their condition may deteriorate to the point of needless and repeated hospitalization. Others end up in the criminal justice system, which houses an estimated half a million people with serious mental illness in the U.S.
This ongoing series on mental health takes an in-depth look at the scope of the problems with a look toward solutions.