UK
NHS officials are to spend the day assessing whether three hospitals can provide proper care for a girl who is believed to be at serious risk of taking her own life when she is released from youth custody in 10 days’ time, and for whom no bed could be found.
Her urgent case was highlighted by the UK’s most senior family judge on Thursday. Sir James Munby said the country would have “blood on its hands” were she released with no proper plan in place for her ongoing care, and expressed his frustration at not being able to safeguard her.
The girl, for legal reasons named only as X, has made a series of “determined attempts” on her own life while in custody, and her carers had said they expected to hear she had made another immediately after her release. With no secure bed available, she was due to be released to the community in 10 days.
On Thursday night, NHS England said it had identified beds in three hospitals and those were scheduled to be assessed on Friday to determine whether any could provide her with the right care and support. They declined to say how many individual places had been identified.
On Thursday evening, Dr Mike Prentice, the medical director for the NHS north region, said: “The judge is quite right that the relevant agencies need to ensure a safe, new care placement for this young woman which is suitable given the great complexities of her situation.
“That’s what’s now happening, and a number of options have now been identified, with detailed clinical and social assessments taking place tomorrow to ensure the right package of care can be put in place before her release date.”
Munby said X needed a place in a low secure bed; in his judgment she had been assessed as not qualifying for a place in a medium secure unit because she was judged as primarily being a danger to herself rather than to others. The judge had been told that a low secure unit place could be found for X for six months.
Her situation became more complex during her time in youth custody, though officials declined to say whether or not she had been reclassified as needing a place in the more secure facility.
Munby, the president of the family division of the high court, issued a stinging attack on the “disgraceful and utterly shaming lack of proper provision in this country of the clinical, residential and other support services”.
The case was a “severe wakeup call” and not isolated, the former children’s minister Tim Loughton said. He told the BBC’s Newsnight programme: “I’m afraid what he said today is nothing new, I’m afraid it’s just one aspect of the shortcomings of mental health services in this country at the moment, and particularly for children and young people.
“This is quite a severe wakeup call and we’ve got to do a lot, lot better for kids in our country who are suffering these sorts of mental illnesses.
“This is a high profile problem today but I’m afraid it’s something that happens all too often. There is a shortage of beds generally, certainly at the severe end. There is certainly a shortage of beds for those people who need help because they are a harm to themselves, potentially.”
By Kevin Rawlinson
4 August 2017
