From the Associated Press:

A national investigation by the Associated Press has found that nursing homes across the country have become a dumping ground for young and middle-aged people with mental illness, sparking violent and sometimes fatal encounters.

Younger, stronger residents with schizophrenia, depression or bipolar disorder are living beside frail senior citizens, and sometimes taking their rage out on them.

“Sadly, we’re seeing the tragic results of the failure of federal and state governments to provide appropriate treatment and housing for those with mental illnesses and to provide a safe environment for the frail elderly,” said Janet Wells, director of public policy for the National Citizens’ Coalition for Nursing Home Reform.

Among the reasons behind the trend: state mental institutions are closing, leaving mentally ill people with nowhere to go; and nursing homes are actively looking for business because more elderly people are healthy enough to stay in their own homes.

From the Dallas Morning News, AP/Houston Chronicle:

The family of Hasib Chishty is seeking permission to sue the state of Texas for a 2002 attack at the Denton State School that left the 34-year-old paralyzed.

Chishty, who has an intellectual impairment but was otherwise physically healthy until the attack, is now unable to walk or feed himself. Chishty’s attacker went to prison and his family has been seeking to sue the state for years, but has been blocked by the Texas sovereign immunity statute.

They are hoping that recent allegations about abuse and neglect in Texas institutions will prompt lawmakers to grant them their day in court.

Kevin Miller, the staffer who attacked Chishty and is now in prison, has described a culture of drug use by himself and staffers and violent abuse of residents in the Denton State School.

In a videotaped statement, Miller called it “the systematic torture of residents … to get them to change behavior, or for sport, or to sadistically try to change their behavior.”

’2 brothers, 2 different sets of rights’

From the Reno [NV] Gazette-Journal:

Six-year-old Alexander Grant has a tax-free bank account that lets his parents save for his college education. Nothing comparable is available for his 11-year-old brother, Elliott, who has Down syndrome.

“Elliott doesn’t have the same account because the government seemingly thinks disabled people should live in poverty.”

Adults with disabilities can’t earn more than $750 a month or they lose their federally guaranteed Medicaid health coverage; nor can they have more than $2,000 in a savings account.

(more…)

From the Asbury Park [NJ] Press with video:

Parents of children with Down syndrome say the healthy, fulfilling lives of their children, like Conor Wright, 18, (shown left), are a far cry from the bleak picture often given by doctors delivering a Down syndrome diagnosis.

A new federal law is supposed to “better inform medical professionals and parents about the realities of the genetic condition” instead of focusing on outdated information and the worst possible outcomes, advocates say.

Better health care and inclusion mean that people with Down syndrome are living longer and more meaningful lives – attending regular schools, holding full-time jobs, playing an active role in their communities, and some even driving cars and attending college.

Conor’s mother, Joyce Wright, says “Life is good,” says Joyce Wright, Conor’s mother.”There are challenges, but the positives so outweigh the negatives.”

See also:

Family says Down diagnosis needn’t be seen as a burden – Asbury Park Press

Earlier posts here and here.

(Asbury Park Press photo)

In an online chat on Washingtonpost.com, conservative commentator Tucker Carlson says he is “one of the few” to defend President Obama’s remark about the Special Olympics. An excerpt:

First it was sort of funny, in a self-deprecating way, and I don’t think we should ever discourage humor, even unsuccessful attempts at it. We don’t have enough as it is.

Second, it was true. Special Olympians generally don’t bowl as well as other people. That’s why they’re in the Special Olympics.

Before you hit send on that hate mail, know that I’m hardly attacking kids with special needs. I think we ought to cherish and protect them (for instance by ceasing to abort the vast majority of kids with Down Syndrome). But I also think we ought to let people make lame jokes if they want, and not jump down their throats in a frenzy of self-righteousness.

(Photo from the Daily Beast)

Rabbi Shmuel Herzfeld, writing in the Washington Post’s On Faith section, compares the president’s “insensitive” jest about the Special Olympics to comic Jackie Mason using the Yiddish ethnic slur “schvartze” in a joke to describe — who else? — the president. Mason hasn’t apologized.

(Story here: Comments about President Obama by Jackie Mason draw racism charges — New York Daily News)

Herzfeld cites the scholar Maimonides to conclude that both men are committing “a great sin.” An excerpt:

Maimonides is referring to people who regularly act in this manner, but the implication is clear: There is nothing funny about making make fun of someone else or using a nickname which the other person does not care for.

Elsewhere the Talmud says in a homiletic fashion that anyone who shames his fellow man in public is considered to have spilled blood. The rabbis explain that on some level it may be worse for the person who is embarrassed as opposed to murdered because he is now forced to live and relive his embarrassment over and over again.

…  let us all continue to make jokes, but not ones that hurt other people.

Herzfeld is the rabbi of the Ohev Sholom — the National Synagogue in Washington, D.C.

See also: Jackie Mason calls Obama the dark word — Jewish Journal of Los Angeles, the God Blog. An excerpt:

Yeah, and I have some friends who were raised white in the south and have Confederate sympathies. They still know better than to use the n-word.

(Photo of Jackie Mason from the Jewish Journal of Los Angeles)

Peter V. Berns, executive director of the The Arc of the United States, is calling on President Obama to use the controversy around his Special Olympics remark as an opportunity to advance public understanding and acceptance of people with intellectual disabilities. The comments come in a letter to the president posted on the organization’s website.

People with intellectual and developmental disabilities “understand that public attitudes, misinformation and negative stereotypes are the biggest obstacle to their inclusion in the community,” Berns said. “Join us in breaking down the attitudinal barriers that stand in the way of full inclusion.”

Berns called on Obama to convene a White House meeting to address the following:

• The 700,000 individuals and their families on waiting lists for home and community based services;
• Recent reports of abuse and neglect of people with intellectual disabilities in Iowa and Texas;
• The institutional bias of the Medicaid system and the lack of adequate funding for community care; and
• The need to address long term care and support.

(File photo from [UK] Guardian)