By Veronica Rocha, Burbank Leader
"...People who cannot function will let their bed or kitchen be overtaken with clutter, he said. They won’t use their dining room table because there is no room to sit down and eat. Some hoard animals.
Extreme hoarders often exhibit other mental illnesses and even gather trash or feces, Boone said. They often suffer from schizophrenia, obsessive compulsive disorder, Alzheimer’s or dementia.
Hoarding has been a significant problem in America since at least the Great Depression, when saving goods was for survival...
...Hoarding became such a costly problem that Los Angeles County created a task force in 1997 devoted to helping local governments deal with the issue.
Hoarding poses health and safety risks, such as fires. Cases of hoarding are often discovered when police or fire officials are called to the home.
The task force tries to educate cities and the public on how to handle hoarding cases, how to solve them and how to get intervention for hoarders, said Danny Redmond, a senior mental health counselor and registered nurse for the county’s Department of Mental Health..." More
