How the 21st Century Cures Act Can Mitigate the Ever Growing Problem of Mass Incarceration

According to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Service Administration (“SAMHSA”), “[s]tudies have found that for youth in the juvenile justice system, 50% to 70% met criteria for a mental disorder and 60% met criteria for a substance use disorder.” According to the Treatment Advocacy Center, “[a] 2008 study reported recent homelessness to be 8 to 11 times more common in jail inmates; the increased risk was attributed in part to mental illness.” 24 See, e.g., Megan Testa & Sara G. West, Civil Commitment in the United States, 7 Psychiatry 30, 33 (2010) (“Since the tightening of criteria for involuntary psychiatric hospitalization, the United States has seen a trend of persons with mental illness being marginalized to unsafe and inappropriate settings. Since deinstitutionalization, there has been a tremendous increase in America's population of people with mental illness who are living on the streets. Ctr. for Behavioral Health Statistics & Quality, supra note 51, at 24. [...]in 2014, 20.2 million adults (8.4%) had a substance use disorder.