On some points in the legal provision for the insane : a letter addressed to the Rt. Hon. Spencer H. Walpole, M.P., Secretary of State for the Home Department / by J.T. Arlidge.

  • Arlidge, J. T. (John Thomas), 1822-1899.
Date:
[1859]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On some points in the legal provision for the insane : a letter addressed to the Rt. Hon. Spencer H. Walpole, M.P., Secretary of State for the Home Department / by J.T. Arlidge. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    deplored; for it testifies strongly to the inadequacy of our existing legal machinery to assure protection and supervision to those of the community who, by the peculiarity of their malady, are the subjects of restraint, and of the deprivation of civil rights. The agitation of the public mind respecting private asylums, and in some degree the tendency of legisla- tion, have contributed to increase the evil. Much might be said to indicate the necessity of fresh legislation to meet the case of private patients, but I desire more particularly to keep the condition of Pauper Lunatics in view. The few statistical quotations above have proved that during the last 15 years we have not been able, in sup- plying asylum accommodation, to keep pace with the de- mands for it. A little reflection will lead to the conviction that there must be something radically wrong in the system pursued, to account for this deplorable result; for, regard- ing insanity as a disease curable in the ratio of 50 per cent, (an assumption fully justified by experience) when brought in its early stage under efficient treatment, the accumulation of the insane above noticed ought not to have occurred. Now, if we look through the reports and statistics of county asylums, we discover that the proportion of patients in them deemed curable is very small, and that in two-thirds or upwards of those admitted, the disease has existed from one to several years. Here then is one very obvious, and, 1 believe, the chief reason of the accumulation of incurable cases, and of the total increase in the number of insane poor. Its explanation is to be found in the erroneous conceptions of parochial officials, that they best study the pockets of the ratepayers by detaining the insane in the workhouse at a less average cost per head, according to the usual calculations, than by sending them to their proper asylum. But the economy exists only at first sight; for an examination of the whole matter (which cannot now be attempted within the b 2