Mental Illness, Alcoholism, and Drug Dependence

Abstract

In recent years, substantial federal interest has developed in mental illness, alcoholism, and drug dependence. Funds for research, training, preventive, and therapeutic programs are becoming increasingly available. Although epidemiological findings do not suggest any increasing rates of mental illness or alcoholism in this century, it is true that many more mind-altering drugs are available and that experimentation may be more widespread. More significant is an increasing awareness that these problems are not particularly social-class-linked. As a problem either permeates, or is acknowledged as affecting, the middle class, positive sanctions for programming are evident. The exercise of social controls, traditionally a police activity, becomes a more appropriate function for other social institutions. Medical definitions take precedence over the legal. The afflicted is perceived as ill rather than criminal. Alternative intervention programs are designed. Means for primary prevention are sought. The skills of the biological, physical, and social scientists and educators are brought to bear upon the problem. In varying degrees—for mental illness, alcoholism, and drug dependence could be placed on a continuum of relative enlightenment (mental illness) to non-enlightenment (drug dependence)—progress is being made. The contemporary American philosophical trend to treat problems pragmatically will eventually dominate. Defining all three as medical and social problems, legal and moralistic approaches are placed in perspective.