Yet Eddie, that teenage boy who loved sport and street dancing, was viewed with such fear that staff in one place remotely locked him in a toilet before dumping a tray of food on the floor. They should not be pumped full of strong anti-psychotic drugs and kept in seclusion. They have autism and learning disabilities, conditions made far worse by stressful confinement and inept treatment away from their loving families. None of these people should be interned in hospital. Or the tragedies such as Stephanie Bincliffe, who died from obesity after her body ballooned while she was in seclusion. The young woman who fled in fear to Africa. Then there are those I cannot name because of legal gagging orders. Or Chris Duck, whose mother found him “dirty, drugged and depressed” and who shed 36kg in one unit. Or Eddie Green, taken in aged 13 and still inside six years later. People such as Tony Hickmott, held in captivity for almost 18 years. Many have been seized from distraught families, often after a simple request for brief respite care or a brief burst of challenging behaviour. Politicians need to get hundreds more people like Beth out of these hellholes. Her father tells me that they are making plans for her to return nearer home. Last week, in proof that these situations can be rapidly resolved, Beth was freed from solitary into a three-room unit, and introduced to a therapy dog. I questioned whether we had really moved on far from Bedlam – and my piece, thankfully, prompted instant action from the Health Secretary, Matt Hancock. She had been there for 21 months and was self-harming, hatch-fed and growing obese. Three weeks ago, I wrote an angry article here about Beth, a teenager with autism held in seclusion in a Northampton hospital. These practices are a flagrant denial of the most basic human rights for British citizens – but they are permitted by politicians, sanctioned by doctors and funded at huge expense by taxpayers. It is happening right now in secretive psychiatric institutions – both private and state-owned. Yet this is happening right here in our country. They remind us of pitiful footage from foreign orphanages or places where people with mental illness are chained to trees. Dickensian nightmare Health Secretary Matt Hancock investigated the case of Beth Yet if families protest, they can be legally removed as protectors and publicly silenced with court orders that threaten to seize all assets. Some slump into depression and shed weight, others swell up through over-eating. They must obey orders to access books, television, even fresh air. They are being handcuffed, bruised, restrained face down by teams of adults, even having their spectacles removed. Yet such actions are being inflicted on innocent young people with autism and learning disabilities. Even if they carry out evil crimes, they are protected by rigorous laws. Your relative, of course, has rights as a citizen. Sometimes with no shower, no sink, no toilet paper – and always with no dignity. Stuffed in a tiny cell with just a mattress on the floor, fed through a hatch like a wild animal. Forced to take drugs they do not need, turning them catatonic, unable to stop dribbling – and if they resist, held down by six guards, stripped and injected with strong sedatives. Taken away by the state against their will to be locked in an institution hours from home. Imagine that it was your son, your daughter, your sister, your brother.
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