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The article in the November 21, 1997, issue about South Africa's apology to APA prompted a letter from Dr. Theodore Pearl-man in the January 16 issue defending South African psychiatrists. As chair of the 1978 committee to visit South Africa, I can assure Dr. Pearlman it was never our intention to criticize or condemn South Africa's psychiatrists. Those we met were neither wicked nor incompetent; in fact, they were pitifully few and beleaguered-fewer than 150 to serve a population of more than 20 million. Certainly we saw no evidence that South Africa's psychiatrists were giving black patients too much or inappropriate medication.
The problems were quite different. In many of the facilities we visited, no neuroleptic medication at all was being provided to black patients, who were also denied such basic necessities as toilet paper and soap. When black patients became physically ill with pneumonia or other infectious diseases, they also went without routine treatment and died.
This failure to provide basic medical and psychiatric care was no doubt, as Dr. Pearlman suggests, the result of apartheid. Most of our report, in fact, emphasized that apartheid did not stop at the door to the hospital, and we tried to document some of the tragic consequences. Life would be much simpler if terrible things were always done by terrible people, but that is just not the case.
Hannah Arendt wrote tellingly about the banality of evil. Most of our report on South Africa was about just such banal but awful events caused by the system of apartheid. We submitted our report almost 20 years ago, and the defenders of apartheid said we were lying. The current government led by Mandela is trying to come to terms with its past. In that context, it saw fit to apologize to APA and our committee, which had been maligned. I am sure I can speak for Charles Pinderhughes, Jeanne Spurlock, and the late Jack Weinberg in thanking the South African government for at last vindicating our efforts.
Alan A. Stone, M.D.
Former APA President