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one's own feet, is a growing modern attitude towards life, and this
drug addiction is posing further problems in the field of mental
health. In speaking about drug dependence recently, a Professor of
Forensic Medicine stated that soft drugs like L.S.D. are the most
dangerous because 'they turn people into psychotics and schizophrenics'.
Prevention in relation to psychoses, especially with regard to
schizophrenia, is very limited although gradually ways are being
found whereby the psychoneurotic and personality disorders may
be avoided. Assistance in the development of stable personalities,
avoidance of emotional trauma in the formative years and support
in life's more important crises are some methods now employed and,
today, it would be right to talk of social psychiatry and community
mental health.
In Britain, just over one-tenth of all hospital beds are occupied
by schizophrenics and it would appear that this disease has attracted
little finance and lesser research time.
There are four main classifications of schizophrenia, briefly:—
1. Simple—exemplified by blunting of feelings and an indifference
in personal relationships usually arising in puberty and
sometimes mistaken for 'bone idleness' or weakness of character.
2. Hebephrenic—patient subject to moods of deep depression
—quite likely to fly into rages over trifles or to laugh uproariously
over serious matters—thoughts appear to be 'under pressure'
giving rise to delusions.
3. Catatonic—patient refuses to speak, eat or talk—their
stupor often presents in bizarre forms such as a frozen stance
with one knee raised stork-like off the ground.
4. Paranoic—most common among the middle-aged and
elderly—patient is subject to hallucinations and delusions such
as hearing voices from heating systems, refrigerators, etc.
Adolescents in working class families appear to be more
susceptible than those from the middle classes and their I.Qs. tend
to be average although a number are extremely clever and talented.
Even their delusive conversation can be logically based. Many
schizophrenics can entertain delusions and yet still have normal
relationships with friends and neighbours and the condition need
not necessarily affect day-to-day social life. However, some schizoid
symptoms can lead to violence. Indeed, the M'Naughten 'Rules'
which formed the basis for judicial consideration of insanity pleas
in the courts were formulated as a result of the murder of Sir Robert
Peel's secretary by the schizophrenic Daniel M'Naughten in 1843.
By means of paper chromatography, a Liverpool University
research team established a link with the non-paranoic schizophrenics
and the presence in the urine of a chemical substance similar to