[2] In other words, wartime pressures had stirred up repressed mental illness in the soldiers, who were a representative statistical sample of the general population, gender aside.

[1] Robert Felix, a psychiatrist appointed as director of the Public Health Service's (PHS) Division of Mental Hygiene in 1944, did much work to try to pass the bill.

They believed that if veterans received federal help and support through preventive services, professional training, and research they would transition back into postwar life quicker and easier.

[1] In addition, organizations like Mental Health America that advocated for changes in the psychiatric field helped push legislation towards action.

These new drugs and treatments improved the lives of those previously suffering from psychosis and delusion and were a result of the new funding and federal support that came from the National Mental Health Act of 1946.