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After attending court hearings Tuesday, one where the person is charged with homicide with a motor vehicle while intoxicated as a repeat offender, I couldn't help but think about how mental health issues are so prevalent in our area.
Heroin overdoses, operating while intoxicated multiple offenses, sexual assault, harassment, restraining orders...these are not signs of a healthy society.
The state of society when it comes to rampant drug use can be shown by the following:
"A Pennsylvania man has been jailed on charges he sold heroin in the hospital maternity ward room where people were visiting his newborn daughter.
"Twenty-five-year-old Cody Hulse was arraigned Friday on charges including heroin delivery and endangering the welfare of children. The Tribune-Review reports he declined to comment afterward.
"Authorities say Hulse got busted after Greensburg Police stopped a vehicle Thursday and found heroin and paraphernalia. The occupants told police they had just bought the drugs from Hulse at Excela Health Westmoreland hospital.
"Police say they went to the maternity room and confronted Hulse, who acknowledged selling the drugs and who had heroin in his pocket.
"Police say Hulse's girlfriend, the baby's mother, told them she didn't know about the drug deals."
Almost makes you believe this is a sign of the apocalypse.
Perhaps we are taking a backwards approach to solving the problem when it comes to mental illness, drug use, alcohol abuse, etc. Government bodies tend to limit funding for programs that would help and that comes from the federal government down.
It is safe to assume that just about everyone knows there is a problem. It is one we all have to ban together to try and make better.
Loosening the governmental purse strings would help.