Eric Adams’s plan may not be perfect, but we desperately need a better system for aiding people who are mentally ill

The ‘shadow boxer on the street corner’

I’m referring here to New York mayor Eric Adams’s now contentious plan to get people who are mentally ill and homeless in New York City off the streets by taking more of them to hospital, even if they don’t want to go. The idea was to target “the shadow boxer on the street corner in Midtown, mumbling to himself as he jabs at an invisible adversary”, as Adams, put it, and other such people who are clearly a danger to themselves or others. Anyone who has lived in New York knows who he is talking about. We’ve been on the subway with such people, and it’s both tragic and terrifying.

I remember dealing with this sort of situation on a regular basis when I moved to the city in 1988, and I can say that we are once again seeing this type of behaviour more frequently. I’m not sure whether it’s about strained city budgets, overcrowded or unsafe shelters, the end of coronavirus stimulus relief and/or an economic slowdown, but I’m certainly encountering greater numbers of people on the street who seem unwell than I did in the pre-Covid past.

This story originally appeared on: Financial Times - Author:Rana Foroohar