8 July 2013

Rosenhan revisited

A couple of weeks ago a tribunal in the UK decided that Ian Brady – probably the country’s most famous living killer – should remain in a high-security psychiatric hospital, rather than being sent to a prison as he wanted. Brady’s lawyers argued that he did not have paranoid schizophrenia, and had never been mentally ill since he was jailed for life in 1966. The outcome of the case was that he has to stay in hospital – no surprise there. What I want to concentrate on in this blog post is a miniscule detail of the case.
25 March 2013

“Let me breathe, let me leave”: a song for Alex in Chisinau

In the Moldovan mental health system, voluntary means involuntary, consent means coercion, yes means no, and a safeguard means a rubber stamp. Reducing law into formalistic fiction creates an environment where healthcare staff mistreat patients to such an extent that some instances amount to torture. The new Moldovan government needs to abandon the focus on hospitals and instead ensure that law underpins autonomy, that budgets are oriented towards community-based supports, and that people with disabilities participate in monitoring human rights.

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