Trump has 'dangerous mental illness', claims psychiatry experts

 

WASHINGTON: A group of psychiatrists has warned in a conference at Yale University that US President Donald Trump has a “dangerous mental illness”.

According to foreign media reports, the mental health experts have claimed that Trump is “paranoid and delusional”, further adding that they have issued the statement as it was their ethical responsibility to warn the American public about the “dangers”  the US president poses to the country.  

Dr John Gartner, a practising psychotherapist who advised psychiatric residents at Johns Hopkins University Medical School, said the President's statement about having the largest crowd at an inauguration was just one of many that served as warnings of a larger problem.

“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,” he added.

Dr Bandy Lee, assistant clinical professor in the Yale Department of Psychiatry, said: “As some prominent psychiatrists have noted, [Trump’s mental health] is the elephant in the room. I think the public is really starting to catch on and widely talk about this now.”

James Gilligan, a psychiatrist and professor at New York University, told the conference opined “I’ve worked with some of the most dangerous people our society produces, directing mental health programmes in prisons,” he said.

“I’ve worked with murderers and rapists. I can recognise dangerousness from a mile away. You don’t have to be an expert on dangerousness or spend fifty years studying it like I have in order to know how dangerous this man is.”

Dr Gartner has started an online petition earlier this year - calling for Trump to be removed from office, which claims that he is “psychologically incapable of competently discharging the duties of President”.

The petition has so far garnered more than 41,000 signatures.

It states: “We, the undersigned mental health professionals (please state your degree), believe in our professional judgment that Donald Trump manifests a serious mental illness that renders him psychologically incapable of competently discharging the duties of President of the United States. 

“And we respectfully request he be removed from office, according to article 4 of the 25th amendment to the Constitution, which states that the president will be replaced if he is 'unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office'."

Earlier, in February, Duty to Warn, which consists of psychiatrists, psychologists, and social workers, signed an open letter warning that his mental state “makes him incapable of serving safely as president”.

The letter warned that the  President’s tendency to “distort reality” to fit his “personal myth of greatness” and attack those who challenge him with facts was likely to increase in a position of power.