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Relatively little attention has been paid to the post-disaster health status and well-being of older persons. The data discussed in this article were gathered through use of a retrospective cohort survey five years following a major flood in the Wyoming Valley of Pennsylvania. The subsample of women sixty-five years and older used in this analysis is composed of 122 female victims and forty-five controls from the same communities. The instruments used to measure mental status included Langner's 22-Item Scale, Zung's Self-rating Depression Scale, and a modified Self-Report Symptom Inventory (SCL-90). Additional items related to self-perceptions of health status, to influence of the flood on health and well-being, and to other issues. Significant differences occurred in self-perceptions, including state of mind after the flood (p less than .001), distress during recovery (p less than .001), quality of life after the flood (p less than .001), and frequency of thinking about the flood matters (p less than .025). Use of the instruments designed to assess mental status did not indicate greater levels of anxiety or depression in elderly victims as compared to non-victims.

A central component of the public's conception of the mentally ill is that they are dangerous. This belief receives support from recent studies of the arrest rates of ex‐mental patients which suggest that arrests for violent crimes have increased. In order to investigate this issue, samples were taken at two points in time. Analysis of arrest rates revealed that very few ex‐mental patients were subsequently arrested for violent crimes, although these rates were higher and increasing faster than these of the general population. Mast significant were the findings that subsequent arrests were best explained by the number of prior arrests and that the percentage of patients with a history of criminal behavior has increased dramatically over time. The implications of these trends in violent crime among ex‐mental patients for the perceived link between mental illness and violence and for the social control functions of society are discussed.

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