Yes, dismissing mental and health problems can make people not seek treatment, further increase them, or at more extreme cases even physically hurt people.
Dismissing social problems can have the equivalent of all those consequences, and even worse ones.
If someone want to do something enough, he should be compelled to seek help to overcome his limitations. Comment like your encourages learned helplessness, which to me is a lot more dangerous than what he said !
I grew up poor, had stints of homelessness, and all my friends/relatives came from the same background.
Learned helplessness is one of, if not the biggest, issues facing socially disadvantaged people. Money, counselling, temporary housing - all of this is moot and useless if the person retains a poor mindset.
Conversely, if there's a positive mindset, then they are most likely going to seek out those opportunities and use them to their advantage.
At least that's my premise.