Support AOT Programs to reduce homelessness, imprisonment and deaths among the mentally ill
From MaryLovesJustice Neal
Please help Treatment Advocacy Center http://www.treatmentadvocacycenter.org/ reach its $10,000 fundraising goal. Funds will be matched. Treatment Advocacy Center seeks to remove barriers to timely treatment for mental illness through assisted outpatient treatment (AOT) programs like Kendra's Law, which already proved to reduce homelessness, imprisonment, arrests, and re-hospitalization by up to 85% among acute mental patients who became program participants in New York. The United States Department of Justice recently certified AOT programs because of their high level of effectiveness. Program participants receive mandated psychiatric treatment along with subsistence assistance (if they qualify financially). AOT programs are successful because mental illness is like any other chronic disease that requires monitoring by qualified health care professionals. AOT programs also keep America's communities safer, because lower arrests mean fewer crimes are being committed. AOT programs reduce America's prison costs, a $50 billion/year expense. Today, there are roughly 1.25million mentally ill inmates in jails and prisons throughout the country - people who should be in hospitals or in community care programs, depending on their offenses and functionality. Mentally ill inmates comprise 60% of those in solitary confinement, punished by living alone in 9 ft x 6 ft cells, often kept naked and sleeping on bare iron to prevent self-harm. Roughly 80% of inmates in solitary confinement are black people. While people with physical diseases are hospitalized or treated as outpatients, mentally ill Americans are usually punished for public displays of their disabilities, and many are killed in arrest attempts every year. Although it violates the U.S. Constitution, some mentally ill and retarded people are executed. Health discrimination is wrong. Help restore people to wholesome living, create safer communities, and reduce prison costs by supporting Treatment Advocacy Center's advocacy for AOT programs nationwide. Give today, and please share this invitation to support mental health care with your email lists. Visit the Treatment Advocacy Center at the first link above to learn about anosognosia, a condition that prevents mentally ill people from knowing they need help. Anosognosia leads sick people to avoid treatment and wind up homeless, dead or incarcerated after avoidable crimes from simple vagrancy to murders. AOT programs work.
Every gift will be matched up to our $10,000 goal!
With only a few hours left, our "AOT Roadshow" campaign is nearing 60% of its goal of raising $10,000 to send our advocates to more states and communities.
Nearly $6,000 in donations had arrived by telephone and mail and through our website donation page by mid-afternoon - and every dollar is being matched by an anonymous donor.
Please consider a last-minute gift to help us meet our goal and double it.
Because the Treatment Advocacy Center accepts no money from entities involved in the sale, marketing or distribution of pharmaceutical products, individual, family and foundation gifts are crucial.
Every gift of any size will help! You may give online through our dedicated "AOT Roadshow" page, by telephone at 703-294-6001 or by mail (200 North Glebe Road, #730, Arlington VA 22203). Checks arriving by the close of business Friday will qualify for the match. (Because of a browser interface issue, the donation form may not be visible until you scroll to the bottom of the page.)
If you haven't seen our video about how we help individuals, families and communities, click on "Making a Difference" and watch it now.
And if you've already given: THANK YOU! We'll send you a message with the final results soon.
The Treatment Advocacy Center is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization. Gifts are tax-deductible to the extent allowed by law. We do not accept funding from pharmaceutical companies or entities involved in the sale, marketing or distribution of such products.
Treatment Advocacy Center
200 N. Glebe Road, Suite 730, Arlington, VA 22203
703 294 6001/6002 (phone) | 703 294 6010 (fax) |
www.treatmentadvocacycenter.org
Mary Neal's Google Profile - http://www.google.com/profiles/MaryLovesJustice - Follow me at Twitter @koffietime - http://twitter.com/koffietime - Current, urgent justice issues from a laywoman's viewpoint at my primary blog http://FreeSpeakBlog.blogspot.com (the name is a joke, believe me). See also http://MaryLovesJustice.blogspot.com and DogJusticeforMentallyIll http://DogJusticeforMentallyIll.blogspot.com JusticeGagged http://JusticeGagged.blogspot.com Davis/MacPhailTruthCommittee http://DMTruth.blogspot.com Mary Neal at HubPages http://MaryNeal.hubpages.com .Recommended articles - http://topsy.com/site/freespeakblog.blogspot.com - Address: MaryLovesJustice@gmail.com (I am censored, but some emails reach my box) Try to phone me at 678.531.0262, however, none of us really has free speech, so they may prevent your call.