Forced Mental Health Treatment - Improved

Thanks to Korora Cranberry for the link.

Unsurprisingly, the best Homeless Mentally Ill article I have seen to date is by Scott Alexander.  Details That You Should Include In Your Article About How We Should Do Something About the Homeless Mentally Ill

3. The patient gets committed to the hospital. The hospital makes an appointment with a judge to legally evaluate the commitment order. But realistically the appointment is 4-14 days out (depending on the state), and by then the patient may well be gone anyway, in which case the hearing can be cancelled. If it does go to trial, the judge will always defer to the psychiatrists, because they’re experts trying to do a tough and socially important job, and the defendant is represented by an overworked public defender who has devoted 0.01 minutes of thought to this case. This is part of why everyone feels comfortable making commitment decisions on vibes. (AVI note: This is one of the parts I am most familiar with.)

In practice, the government tries some combination of these things, each of which works a little. Sometimes they fiddle with the law around inpatient commitment around the edges. Sometimes they give people free houses. Sometimes they threaten them with Involuntary Outpatient Commitment orders. Sometimes they throw them in prison. Most of these things work a little. Some of them could work better with more funding.

From the outside, all problems look simple.