Report on insanity and idiocy in Massachusetts / by the Commission on Lunacy under resolve of the Legislature of 1854.

  • Massachusetts. Commission on Lunacy.
Date:
1855
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Report on insanity and idiocy in Massachusetts / by the Commission on Lunacy under resolve of the Legislature of 1854. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    115/248 (page 105)
    1855.] wherever these lunatics may be, whether native or foreign, in- dependent or pauper, curable or incurable, the Commonwealth is not only deprived of that amount which by their earnings in health they contributed to its income, but more is.now needed for their support than when they wxre able to earn it. There being, then, no question whether the State and its people will bear this burden and support these lunatics, still the question may be asked, whether the weight may not be diminished in part and sustained in part with more ease to the Commonwealth, and to the towns, and to the friends of the patients. It has already been stated (page 69) that insanity, if not cured in its early stages, becomes more and more difficult to be removed, and, in course of a longer or shorter period, vary- ing mostly from two to five years, becomes fixed and incurable. Then the patient is to be supported for life. On the other hand, if the disease be submitted to proper remedial measures, three-fourths or nine-tenths may be restored, and this proportion of the patients made again self-supporting members of society. The time required for the cure of different patients, in dif- ferent forms or ^degrees of disease, varies from a few months in most cases to a few years in extreme cases.* The question, then, in regard to the curable cases, which constitute three-fourths or nine-tenths of all when attacked, is between the effort and the expenditure needed for their support and the restorative means durii^g the healing process through a few months, or their support during their lives. Between the cost of supporting for a few months and that of supporting for life, no private economist, and certainly no political economist or statesman, should hesitate. The cost of restoring a lunatic to health, and enjoyment, and power of self-sustenance, and of contributing to the sup- port of his family, and also of bearing his part of the burden of the State, is limited, and easily paid in money; the gain is unmeasured. But the cost of lifelong lunacy, distressing and * The reports of five American hospitals show that the average time required for the recovery of the patients who had been deranged less than one year, was about five and a half months, and for all patients a little less than seven months. See Appendix, A.