While Virginia has been coping with COVID, the state has also been overwhelmed by people in need of mental health services. As Sandy Hausman reports, hospitals and community programs are unable to meet the need, and the situation could get worse over the holidays.
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The pandemic has so seriously strained already tight state psychiatric hospitals in Georgia, Virginia, Texas and elsewhere that these facilities for the poorest and most vulnerable people with mental illness struggle to admit new patients.
Many patients dealing with mental health crises are having to wait several days in an ER until a bed becomes available at one of Georgia's five state psychiatric hospitals, as public facilities nationwide feel the pinch of the pandemic.
The pandemic has so seriously strained already tight state psychiatric hospitals that these facilities for the poorest and most vulnerable people with mental illness struggle to admit new patients.