By Jeremy Laurance.
Routledge
£9.99
ISBN 0 415 369 800  

The subtitle sets the scene, although Jeremy Laurance reminds us that 90 per cent of the 600,000 with enduring mental health problems do not pose a danger to themselves or others. In graphic style he recalls high-profile violence that has emphasised the fear of enabling "forensic" patients the freedom to live in the community unmonitored.

Although a role of government is to protect the community, it faces the criticism of denying freedom based on a psychiatric risk assessment. Meanwhile, funding is being diverted from community care for the 90 per cent to accommodate and monitor those considered dangerous. Mental illness is assumed, incorrectly, by many to mean schizophrenia and potentially dangerous. Let us not forget that mental illness is a variety of diagnoses dominated by, among other things, depressions, neuroses and brain disorders.

It is no coincidence that the major mental illnesses and consequent suicides and murders are high in deprived communities such as Hackney in London. This is where poverty, crime, single parents, poor schooling and disease predominate.

The question, obscured by the constant drama, is what should be done to prevent mental illness.

John Wilder is director, Psychiatric Rehabilitation Association.