Goudie's column missed the point
Chuck Goudie's column about the NIU shooter ("There were many red flags," Daily Herald, Feb. 16) focuses on the wrong problem.
It wasn't that no one noticed that the young man was having difficulties. It was that there was little anyone could have done if they had noticed.
It wasn't individuals who failed; it was the system.
Illinois' mental health system is under staffed and under funded to the point it earns failing grades from national ranking agencies.
Suppose one of the individuals Mr. Goudie blames would have decided to do something.
There is no mental health hotline as there is for, for example, suspected child abuse.
The Illinois Division of Mental Health's Web site advises people to call 911 in an emergency.
But unless the person in question has committed a crime or is obviously a threat to himself or others, that route will be a dead end.
Suppose a concerned individual had called the local community mental health center. These centers have no outreach workers who could call on the person to check compliance with medication or do an evaluation. Their advice is to take the person to a hospital emergency room for an evaluation. But it wasn't an emergency; it was a red flag.
Would an improved system have made a difference? If had we a better mental health system would there have been a way to monitor compliance with the medication the shooter was supposed to have been taking? Maybe.
There was no case manager keeping in touch with the young man. Would there have been if we had a better mental health system? Maybe.
Would his friends have contacted the mental health system if the face of treatment for mental illness in Illinois were more public? If the stigma attached to mental illness were not so great? Maybe.
If Illinois had the mental health system we should have, at any point a supportive intervention might have averted this tragedy.
Of course it is also possible that even the best mental health system in the world would have been unable to prevent it. But it would be better if our society had such a system and had tried its best
Hugh Brady
Palatine