OUR LUNATIC ASYLUM.

Auckland Star, Volume XVIII, Issue 157, 6 July 1887, Page 4

OUR LUNATIC ASYLUM.

In another column appears the report of Messrs Ewington and Stevenson's official quarterly visit to the Lunatic Asylum yesterday, and it will probably be read with interest by the general public. Very much more interest than formerly is now taken in the question of lunacy, not only by doctors and legislators, but by philanthropists, scientists, and the public at large. Our attention is drawn towards it, not only by the immense expense it is to this colony, but by the great increase of lunacy. It is surprising that ip a young colony like this, where the struggle'for existence has been anything bub fierce, we should have over 1,600 lunatics. li\

New Zealand, 1 in 370 of the population is incarcerated in lunatic asylums, and the proportion elsewhere is as follows:—Victoria, 1 in 297; New South Wales, 1 in 374; Queensland, lin 416; South Australia, 1 in 439; England and Wales, lin 339. During the last few years there seems to have been an increase of insanity in civilised countries, but probably much of the apparent increase is due to improved means of .registration, abatement of prejudice against lunacy as a disgrace (which of course it is not any more than other diseases), and a consequent willingness on the part of rich and poor to. let their * relatives go to asylums for treatment. No less than 29 iresh lunatics have been sent to our asylum during last quarter. 'But there is one-feature in the account of,this visit which demands notice. The visitors are reported to have protested against some people, notably from the Eefuge, and unfit for the Asylum, being sent out there. We protest, too,-against such a thing, not only because "it is unfair to the poor demented creatures, who need all the accommodation of the Asylum, and for whom it was built at considerable cost, but because of a pernicious practice which may grow up here, as it has done elsewhere, of placing in the public asylum persons who might and should be cared for by their own friends. The subject of the issue of certificates of lunacy is one that should receive further consideration. If these certificates aro too easily and recklessly granted, or may be issued by persons having no real qualification for deciding what constitutes insanity, who knows but that some enemy, or relative, or " interested person, may run any eccentric but innocent person into an asylum 1 Such things have happened again and again in England. According to Dr. Macgregor'3 official report to Parliament, " Two patients were committed to the Wellington, Asylum and were found n,ot to be insane." But of course four doctors had certified to their madness, and pocketed their fees for so doing, and we have no guarantee that some poor innocent creatures may not be unjustly incarcerated in our own Asylum. An eminent specialist on lunacy said recently that many doctors know no more about insanity than they know about the higher mathematics. We think it would be better for the committing Magistrate to select two of the best local medical authorities to assist him in his examination, and keep to them, instead of accepting the help of any two doctors who can be got hold of first; but best of all, to follow the Continental practice, and submit the doctors' reports and all the evidence ,to an expert, before committing to an-asylum. This is one of the questions which has of late agitated the medical profession in England, and we hope the problem of insanity will receive that careful solution which its importance demands. The fact that the official visitors are alive to the grave importance of their duties is gratifying, and as they are statutory officers, having great powers under the Lunatics Act of 1882, we hope they will exercise great vigilance and discretion in prosecuting all their inquiries. It is a most serious thing to brand persons with lunacy. Even when they leave an asylum cured, people are afraid to employ them, and we have had a case in Auckland where a poor fellow who was discharged from the Asylum cured went and begged to be locked up in prison because people were afraid of him on learning where he had come from. We are glad to learn that everything seems to be going on satisfactorily at the Asylum, and we notice that the Superintendent and the attendants have received a meed of praise. If there is one class of sufferers more helpless and hopeless than others, it is lunatics, and the tendency of modern legislation and practice is to relieve the gloom and misery of their.lives as much as possible. ■ Considering that our local Asylum costs us nearly ;£IO,OOO a year, the inmates ought to bo well cared for, and it is gratifying to note that the average cost per head in Auckland is considerably less than at some of the other asylums in the colony.