The US has a mental health crisis that could undermine our democracy, US surgeons general say

While working in the West Wing under President George W. Bush, then-US Surgeon General Dr. Richard Carmona got a terrible telephone call from his daughter. After he had been missing, she found Carmona’s adult son in a catatonic state. He sat in the corner of his father’s home for two days and he kept screaming “incoming, incoming.” Carmona’s son served in the army for 21 years, and Carmona said while he doesn’t talk much about it, his son has had “crippling PTSD” and been in and out of mental care facilities since that incident. Yet when the family initially sought help from the VA, Carmona said, even with all of his connections as surgeon general, they...