Maybe if we did, that sad, fucked-up person might not have felt compelled to go out and shoot people and then himself. Mental illness kills.

The insurance companies refused to pay psych providers with all kinds of made up restrictions.
They knew the psych community was not powerful enough to fight them.

Many went out of business. Only the very prudent and small overhead psychologists survived.
And psychiatrists retrained in other medical specialties.

So we now have a severe shortage of psych providers.

is a deadly combination.

Police did nothing about it even though he already had a previous conviction for a gun violation.

Ronald Regan shut down mental health hospitals say we have medications now. No longer need these places. In some cases we still need them. IMHO