Relatives and charities are calling for disabled adults with difficult behaviour currently sectioned under the Mental Health Act to be released to receive better treatment more cheaply at home or in the community.
What sort of ‘difficult behaviour’..?
Jan Tregelles, chief executive of Mencap, said there “can be no excuses” for carers using hospitals as long-term homes for learning-disabled adults with challenging behaviour.
Oh, right, now it’s ‘challenging behaviour’! Make up your minds.
Kevin Healey, who campaigns for better rights and treatment for people with autism, said: “These cases are appalling. We’re in the 21st century now but it’s like we’re living in the 1940s when autism was newly discovered.
“Society institutionalises it. These people need a unique care package. They should be integrated into society, not locked away.”
Funny, but there’s a lot of people saying the exact
opposite, pressurising for special treatment to be
separate from society, even if just for a while!
'..it’s like we’re living in the 1940s when autism was newly discovered.'
ReplyDeleteIt's very curious that so many previously unheard-of 'diseases' and 'conditions' were 'discovered' once the pharmaceutical industry got going after 1945.
As someone who has had experience of someone being sectioned, I'd say that a persons behaviour has to be extremely 'challenging' before the authorities are prepared to section anyone.
ReplyDeleteMy friend's brother was having paranoid delusions and threatening to kill his sister and mother (to save them from the sinister forces that were going to take over the world of course) and still the mental health didn't want to act. Eventually the family convinced them to act after months of worry about his increasingly erratic behaviour, and their own safety.
So it hardly seems likely that the mental hospitals of the country are stuffed with people who are merely autistic.
Ah got free kidz right basically...one is atism, oner is ashburgers and one is ADHD, ah wont a noo aaaahse!
ReplyDeleteGimmmeeee gimmmeee
Loving parents tried to get their son sectioned after he went off meds: his social worker and mental health person thought otherwise. Tragically he slaughtered his parents not the "experts". Lessons were learned etc...
ReplyDelete"It's very curious that so many previously unheard-of 'diseases' and 'conditions' were 'discovered' once the pharmaceutical industry got going after 1945."
ReplyDeleteVery interesting indeed, isn't it?
"..I'd say that a persons behaviour has to be extremely 'challenging' before the authorities are prepared to section anyone."
Yup, a quick glance through any newspaper would show anyone with any common sense (or someone with no axe to grind) the follow of crying 'wolf!' here.
"Tragically he slaughtered his parents not the "experts"."
The consequences of their poor decision making are (nearly) always borne by others.
Hence there's no real incentive for them to change.