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San Diego Union-Tribune

San Diego Union-Tribune

3mon ago

Health

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More people can be held against their will under new law taking effect Jan. 1

San Diego Union-Tribune
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A new law expands the definition of "gravely disabled" to include substance use disorder and mental health disorders.

For the first time in the state’s history, it will be possible for a Californian to be involuntarily detained without committing a crime.

The law was signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom in fall of 2023 .

A big concern one year ago was that there would be a massive surge of detainees, especially those suffering from severe addictions, brought to already packed community emergency departments that are ill-equipped to treat substance use disorders.

But experts say they believe that the onslaught may not be as fierce as many anticipated.

The law allows local governments to punt the law to Jan. 1, 2026 .

San Francisco may have seen a relatively low volume of additional 5150 detentions under the expanded definition of grave disability.

That may be because needed services to treat such detentionions is not widely available.

“It’s unclear if they’re actually fully implementing SB 43 , just because a lot of legal structure was not in place,” Jain said.

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