Mental
health professionals meet at Yale, warn Trump's state 'putting country in danger'
A group of mental health
professionals gathered at Yale University on April 20 to discuss what they
believe is their duty to warn the public of the "danger" posed by
President Donald Trump.
The "Duty to Warn" event
was attended by roughly two dozen people and was organized Dr. Bandy Lee,
assistant clinical professor in the Yale Department of Psychiatry, the CTPost
writes.
Lee called the mental health of the
president "the elephant in the room," and said: "Colleagues are concerned about the
repercussions of speaking."
Yale did not sponsor the event, and
said that conference-goers were expected to follow the Goldwater Rule. Enacted in 1973, it bars psychiatrists from giving
their professional opinion on the mental health of a person they have not met.
In fact, the Duty to Warn group
"has drawn considerable criticism from the psychiatric establishment"
for flouting the rule, the Associated Press writes.
"Basically, one cannot speak of
public figures under any circumstance," Lee said, according to NPR member
station WSHU. "And to do that under this current climate of
grave concern is, in my mind, is actually a political statement.”
"We do believe that Donald Trump's
mental illness is putting the entire country, and indeed the entire world, in
danger," argued Dr. John Gartner, a psychologist who used to teach at
Johns Hopkins University, local WTNH writes. "As health professionals we have
an ethical duty to warn the public about that danger," he said.
"Worse than just being a liar
or a narcissist, in addition he is paranoid, delusional and grandiose thinking
and he proved that to the country the first day he was President. If Donald
Trump really believes he had the largest crowd size in history, that's
delusional," Gartner added.
