04.10.12
Preventative intervention
The shocking disparity between the proportion of offenders with mental illness and the number who receive adequate diagnosis and treatment is being highlighted in the run-up to World Mental Health Day.
The consequences of this failure to provide necessary care are far-reaching. The prisoners themselves will obviously suffer as a result, but so too will the communities they are expected to integrate into, the victims of reoffending, the health service and our already full prisons.
There is a real opportunity to improve the outcomes for all those involved, if this is made a priority.
Coordinated working between the community, prisons and mental health providers will be necessary, and the complication of several different problems will compound the challenge.
Yet it is a challenge that must be faced.
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