Report of the Royal Commission on Lunatic Asylums of the Province of Quebec.

  • Québec (Province). Royal Commission on Lunatic Asylums of the Province of Quebec.
Date:
1888
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Report of the Royal Commission on Lunatic Asylums of the Province of Quebec. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by King’s College London. The original may be consulted at King’s College London.

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    for by the increased comfort of the patients aud the greater efficacity of the treatment which brings about a larger uamber of cures and more prompt aud more lasting. Lucre is the necessary correlative of farming out and the fact of the insane being let out by contract leads the public to see in the contractors only specu.lation and a stinginess which in many cases is only too real. In view of the actual state of affairs, the Commissioners do not think they can ask the Grovernment to take over all the asylums of the Province. We are of opinion that the establishment under the control of the Sisters of j Providence might, with the modifications pointed out in the conclusions ] arrived at by the Commission, give satisfaction to the Grovernment. In these | conclusions will also be found the opinion as to what should be done with respect to the Beauport Asylum and St. Ferdinand d'Halifax. It is to the knowledge of the Commissioners that an asylum is about to be built in Montreal, specially intended for the Protestant Insane of the Province, and where poor patients of this religion will be received. It would be as well, the cost of the support of these patients being at the expense of the Government, before passing the contract, to weigh thoroughly the difiB-Culties raised up to this time by the farming system. On this subject, it may not be amiss to recall here the opinion expressed' by the medico-chirurgical society of Montreal on the 1st November, 1886, and which may be summarized as follows : 1. That the farming out of the care of lunatics, either to private indi- viduals or to private corporations, is practically everywhere abandoned because it is prejudicial to the best interests of the insane and gives the minimum of cures ; 2. That all the establishments intended for the treatment of the insane should be owned, managed by and under the direct control and supervision q£ the Grovernment, without the intermediary of interested persons. This opinion was at the time approved of and shared in by the entire English press of the country.
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