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Mary LaskerMary Lasker
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Part:         Session:         Page of 1143

Now, the outlook from Hein's figures in '54 was that about 20 percent of the people, if properly treated with Serpasil, in mental institutes might be expected to be released. This is a high figure and time will have to pass in order to find out if it is too high or too low. Now, the time actually has passed, and we're now in 1963, and there are 43,000 fewer people in state mental hospitals, approximately, within the last year at least, than there were in 1955, and a large number more have been treated and released than ever were before.

Q:

This is a national figure, isn't it?

Lasker:

Yes, this is a national figure.

There are, however, when you look at it state by state, you'll see that there are a many states where they have made very small progress in dropping their admissions, as compared with maybe 20 others states who have dropped their admissions or dropped the total population by anything from 10 to 15 percent.

Now, the fact that Dr. Klein's estimates have been met, I think on the whole, means that the drugs haven't been used energetically enough by enough states, because there are some states that have made very small progress and there are some states that even have more patients than they had before, not very many but there are a few. That means they aren't using the drugs in sufficient quantity or that the personnel for





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