The overloaded hospital system should be only for those with acute needs, For most hospitals every person in hospital who does not have acute need is a person who does have acute needs kept waiting on a an emergency room corridot, or shunted to a different hospital. The goal of no discharge into homelessness is a desirable one — but it should be met by ensuring emergency housing services are adequate and work in coordination with hospitals, not by trying to keep people in hospitals if the services aren’t there.

The idea that hospitals can keep people there who are out of medical crisis and are there awaiting accomodation would be inappropriate (hospital beds are vastly more expensive than short term acccomodation in general) at the best of times, but when the hospitals are, in many cases, so devoid of excess capacity that they can’t properly perform their primarily medical functions, its simply untenable.

Not that I’d defend Capolingua in general. But she has a point on this.

They then will repeat the bit about not being a union.

As I have said before, the AMA is the representative of senior doctors in private practice. It exists to further the interests of that sub-group of medical practitioners. It also represents Hospital employed junior doctors but, at best, begrudgingly. When the interests of those junior doctors intersect with their senior colleagues, the hierarchy of interest is clear.

The AMA, somewhat like the Police Union, leverages the good reputation of its’ members to behave without scruples as their collective expression.

I don’t agree about them not acting in a similar way to a union – except that the AMA is noisier and more powerful than most unions….and not subject to legal harassment. They’re a guild and they protect their turf pretty strongly. No doubt there are often sound reasons for that, and as a trade unionist myself I don’t begrudge them that, but I do begrudge right-wingers basically trying to outlaw the sweaty, beastly union I belong to, while passing over the AMA in silence.

Hypocrisy and classism, simple as that.

If I were a doctor, I’d be upset about my compulsory fees going to that closed-shop of a Liberal attack machine at the moment.

I hope there’s a strong emphasis on mental health treatment in the government’s policy. Inceasing funding for mental health – nationally – is actually one of the things Morris Iemma can be justly proud of.

Doesn’t it feel good to have a government that actually cares about things like homelessness?

Helen and A. are quite right: there is no such population as “the homeless” — there are eight or twelve or twenty subgroups which all commonly experience homelessness as a symptom of a greater problem, whether it’s mental illness, domestic violence, substance issues, or other. By treating the subgroups discretely (and esp. by early treatment of the more easily treatable) you can reduce the aggregate over time, freeing up more resources for the more difficult and expensive subgroups.

It can be done, and it should be done. Good luck to you Angharad as you seem personally involved in advancing solutions.

i totaly agree with the project and the sentiment that accompanies it, far too little has been done to address this issue of late. When i worked in detoxs i found few processes as disspiriting as exiting clients into homelessness. However i think that the Govt is on a hiding to nothing if they think that they can implement a no exits to homelessness from drug and alcohol services. far too many exits from detox and rehab are too sudden for any planning to take place.