‘You’re treated like a criminal’: Wisconsin eyes fixes for emergency mental health system

Thu
16
Mar

‘You’re treated like a criminal’: Wisconsin eyes fixes for emergency mental health system


Chrissy Barnard is a peer support specialist with the National Alliance on Mental Illness Wisconsin. Before her recovery, she was hospitalized for mental health-related issues more than 30 times in Wisconsin and Minnesota. “The whole system needs to change, because it’s so traumatizing. You’re treated like a criminal from the get-go, she says of Wisconsin’s disparate county-by-county system for delivering crisis care. “For someone who has no history of violence, or a criminal record or anything, it’s totally humiliating.” (Submitted photo)

When Chrissy Barnard faced a mental health crisis and most needed care, law enforcement  handcuffed her, placed her in the back of a patrol car and drove her five hours to Wisconsin’s only state-run mental health facility for the general public.

 

 


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