The Manawatu Herald. Thursday, September 8, 1910. MENTAL DISEASES BILL.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXII, Issue 889, 8 September 1910, Page 2

The Manawatu Herald. Thursday, September 8, 1910. MENTAL DISEASES BILL.

The Mental Defectives Bill has been introduced into Parliament. Chiefly it is a consolidating measure, but there are a few important amendments of the law proposed. One important feature is a new and much wider definition of what is meant by the term ‘‘mentally defective person.” Under the Bill it means “any person who owing to his mental condition requires oversight, care, or control for his own good or in the public interest, and who, according to the nature of his mental defect and of the oversight, care or control deemed to be necessary is included in one of the following classes(l) Persons of unsound mind, that is, persons who owing to disorder of the mind are incapable of managing themselves or their affairs; (2) persons mentally infirm, that is, persons who through mental infirmity arising from age or the decay of their faculties are incapable of managing themselves or their affairs; C 3) idiots « that is > persons so deficient in mind from birth or an early age that they are unable to guard themselves against common physical dangers, and therefore require the oversight, care or control exercised as in the case of young children; (4) imbeciles, persons who though capable of guarding themselves against common physical dangers, are incapable, or if of school age will presumably when older be incapable of earning their own living by reason of mental deficiency existing from birth or from an early age ; (5) feeble minded, that is, persons who may be capable of earning a living under favourable circumstances, but are incapable from mental deficiency existing from birth or from an early age of competing on equal terms with their normal fellows or of managing themselves and their affairs with ordinary prudence ; (6) epileptics, that is, persons suffering from epilepsy who are also mentally infirm and require such oversight, care or control as to justify their inclusion in a separate class. Provision is also made for persons voluntarily becoming inmates of institutions for the treatment of persons mentally deficient. In such a case the voluntary boarder, as he is called, will be compelled to stay in the institution for a period of seven days, during which time he will be under the supervision of the medical officer on whose report he will either be retained for further treatment or discharged.