Manyebook

Lay My Burden Down: Suicide and the Mental Health Crisis Among African-Americans

Despite despair precipitated by racism and poverty, the black community has always experienced a very low rate of suicide. Yet from 1980 to 1995, suicides among black youths increased 114 percent.

This alarming statistic demonstrates a real crisis in America's health care system. The most prominent African-American psychiatrist and an award-winning journalist (both of whom lost siblings to self-destructive behavior), offer Lay My Burden Down as an essential response to a national emergency.

Beginning with a concise analysis of the often troubled relationship between African-Americans and a white medical establishment, Poussaint and Alexander trace the historical, cultural, and social factors that prevent blacks from seeking medical treatment and document the failed response of white health professionals. Most important, they ask us to look again at abuse, gunplay, and the increase in HIV cases among African-Americans not exclusively as predictable products of racism and poverty but also as examples of self-destructive, suicidal behavior. Intervention is possible, and Poussaint and Alexander cite many ways that our national health care system and health care professionals may help, while noting the programs and policies that have already begun to make a difference. A crucial initiative, Lay My Burden Down will change how we view mental health care in America.

About the Authors:

A former consultant for The Cosby Show, Alvin F. Poussaint, M.D., is professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and the Judge Baker Children's Center in Boston, Massachusetts. He lives in Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts.

Amy Alexander is a freelance journalist and editor of The Farrakhan Factor. She lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

  • Format
  • hardcover
  • Pages
  • 194
  • Language
  • english
  • ISBN
  • 9780807009604
  • Genres
  • psychology
  • Release date
  • 2000