and hospitals are legally required to treat their patients using actual, FDA-approved medical practices/procedures.

For now.

There’s already a number of hospital networks who refuse to provide pediatric trans care because they were essentially bullied into submission by this administration

Fwiw his point to bring back mental institutions has some merit in that interim programs and supported rehabilitation should be expanded though there’s no way he means it this way and he has no intention to fund mental health treatment, only pseudo prisons.

Starting in the 1960s the number of mental hospitals dropped precipitously. Mainly because of outrage at conditions, watch the Geraldo documentary on the willowbrook school, released in 1972, which further accelerated an already started trend because it was correct and conditions were atrocious

However, what is left out is that these places weren’t replaced with anything until much later. This led to decades of issues. Hospitals focused on physical health took the brunt, and social issues measurably worsened. This led to a rising trend in jailing people who were suffering from mental health issues and homelessness, which drastically hastened under Reagan in the 1980s

In the roughly 50 years since then psychiatry and social work in almost every state have moved towards community programs, in home services, and when things are extremely severe residential treatment and supportive rehabilitation residences. However, funding for mental health dropped almost constantly as asylums closed so these programs often started with shoestring budgets. Further for every president since Reagan these budgets have essentially continually dropped year after year. Sometimes tremendously; many states destroyed Medicaid and mental health funding in 2008 during the recession and since then it continually goes down or at best stays stagnant year after year

As a result most of these interim programs are inaccessible for many because they can only staff so much. On top of that the clinical fidelity is often poor to extremely terrible because you simply can’t attract talent. When I started in the field I did residential treatment for $9/hr. I then did mobile case management for $11. That was almost 20 years ago and those jobs now pay $13 and $15 respectively, still atrocious. Staff turnover is high because why not just work at target? You won’t have the constant threat of severe injuries (I literally just got an epidural steroid injection today to deal with a progressively worsening back injury from like 2015 at work), extremely depressing situations (I still remember the several case management clients I had who are dead because it was during the Wild West opioid days), terrifying liability (what do you do when someone is suicidal with a plan and begs you not to hospitalize? What do you do when you witness child abuse that is borderline at best and you know cps will just waste everyone’s time and destroy the rapport you have for no consequence? (You still report)). It’s not like when you have commercial ppo insurance through work and can see a decent licensed clinician for $10 copay (and the clinician gets 100-150/hr)

So then you get the people who actively resist funding these programs because they’re shithead politicians that just block any social service. But you create a situation where they give themselves ammo. They underfund the system so much as to cripple it. Then they can point to poor consumer satisfaction, poor outcomes, etc and starve them further. They can also gain constituents by having them experience this subpar treatment and then campaigning on tearing it all down (once again with no alternative proposed, which means prison)

Because that's what the science says to do and hospitals are legally required to treat their patients using actual, FDA-approved medical practices/procedures.

Legally required… unless whatever law he excretes changes that

hospitals are legally required to treat their patients using actual, FDA-approved medical practices/procedures.

There's [the flaw](hospitals are legally required to treat their patients using actual, FDA-approved medical practices/procedures). If the FDA bans a type of treatment because its unpopular with the regime, people are fucked.