ABSTRACT
The statistics quoted are necessarily predicated on the basis that mental illness can be reliably diagnosed by reference to internationally accepted criteria. Whilst the WHO is rightly concerned about the incidence of mental illness as a public health issue, the labelling of certain forms of behaviour as ‘mental illness’ is still subject to controversy surrounding not only the identification of mental disorder, but whether mental illness exists at all. There is also concern as to the use of mental illness by States as a convenient method of coercion against opponents of the prevailing political regime.17 Among the foremost critics of recognition of mental illness is Thomas Szasz, who has written recently: ‘... mental illnesses, like ghosts, are non-existent entities and … psychiatry, like slavery, rests on coercing individuals as nonpersons.’18 Szasz is concerned about the profound consequences that a diagnosis of mental illness can have for the individual. It can lead to the deprivation of liberty and the imposition of treatment without consent, even when the individual is legally competent and poses no threat to third persons.19 Social exclusion is often a result. Physical illnesses do not normally attract the same antipathy.
