Evening Republican, Volume 15, Number 183, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 4 August 1911 — INSANITY ON THE INCREASE [ARTICLE]

INSANITY ON THE INCREASE

Number of Afflicted in the United States Is Assuming Alarming Proportions. The number of insane persons In hospitals in the United States on January 1,1804, was not less than 150,151. This was more than double the number of 1890, which was 74,028. From 1904 to 1910 the insane in hospitals in New York alone Increased 25 per cent. It is safe to say, writes Homer Folks In the American Review of Reviews, that the Insane now In hospitals in the United States number at least 200,000.

The population of Nevada and Wyoming in 1910 together is about equal to the population of the hospitals for the insane in the United States. The total annual cost of caring tor the insane in the United States is in the neighborhood of 150,000,000 a year. About one-sixth of the total expenditure of the state of New York is for the care of the insane. The New York State Charities Aid association has outlined and is carrying Into effect a movement for popular education along scientific lines by sound psychological methods as to the causes and prevention of Insanity. As one ‘factor In this educational movement a short leaflet has been prepared stating in simple language the essential facts as to the causes of Insanity so far as they are now known. This leaflet is being printed by hundreds of thousands, and is being placed In the hands of men, women, boys and girls, through every form of organisation willing to help In distributing It It has been sent to every physician in the state, to the principal of every public school, to all clergymen, college presidents and faculties, superintendents of city schools, health officers, county school commissioners, secretaries of Y. M. C. A’s to officers of labor unions, proprietors of factories, department stores, laundries, to city officials, officers of local granges, officers of fraternal orders; in short to all the various types of organisations that are willing to promote such an effort for the public good.