{"id":13435,"date":"2024-02-21T12:11:56","date_gmt":"2024-02-21T12:11:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newsmediauk.org\/?post_type=case-studies&#038;p=13435"},"modified":"2024-08-29T14:38:30","modified_gmt":"2024-08-29T13:38:30","slug":"nhs-abuse-scandal","status":"publish","type":"case-studies","link":"https:\/\/newsmediauk.org\/blog\/case-studies\/nhs-abuse-scandal\/","title":{"rendered":"NHS Abuse Scandal"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>A joint investigation from the Independent, spearheaded by their health correspondent, Rebecca Thomas, and Sky News&#8217;s Rob Mulhern, revealed an alarming number of cases of sexual abuse and assault within the UK&#8217;s psychiatric system.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The 18-month investigation found that &#8220;almost 20,000 reports of<a href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/news\/health\/sexual-assault-nhs-domestic-violence-b2266281.html\">\u00a0sexual incidents in the last five years<\/a>&#8221; were made in &#8220;more than half of NHS mental health\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/topic\/trusts\">trusts<\/a>&#8221; since 2019. The Independent spoke to multiple patients and their families about stories of assault and abuse. Dr Lade Smith, president of the Royal College of Psychiatrists, called\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/voices\/editorials\/mental-health-care-sexual-abuse-women-b2486249.html\">the findings \u201chorrendous\u201d,<\/a>\u00a0while then shadow health secretary Wes Streeting MP said it was a \u201cwake-up call\u201d for the government. Dame Vera Baird, the former victims&#8217; commissioner, called the results of the investigation &#8220;a national scandal.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The main findings from the investigation are:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>At least 19,899 sexual incidents were reported across more than 30 NHS trusts between 2019 and November 2023 \u2013 including staff assaults on patients and patients assaulting other patients<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>The figures suggest that just 982 \u2013 less than 5 per cent \u2013 of sexual incidents reported to hospitals were referred to the police over the same period<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>800 allegations of rape and serious assaults on women<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Mixed sex wards, despite being banned a decade ago, are still in use across NHS mental health care with more than 500 reports of sexual assault since 2019<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Just six out of 50 hospitals were able to prove they were meeting NHS standards aimed at protecting patients from sexual harm<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>MP for Birmingham, Yardley, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/voices\/nhs-sexual-abuse-women-girls-psychiatric-hospitals-b2486285.html\">Jess Phillips, wrote for the Independent<\/a> &#8211; she said the &#8220;sheer scale and mishandling of sexual abuse and violence in our nation&#8217;s mental health facilities&#8221; had left her &#8220;aghast.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The Independent have<a href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/voices\/editorials\/mental-health-care-sexual-abuse-women-b2486249.html\"> called on the government<\/a> to &#8220;act urgently&#8221; in the face of the investigation&#8217;s horrific revelations, calling for a &#8220;cultural change from the very top of government down to every mental hospital ward&#8221; to end this scandal &#8220;once and for all.&#8221; After the Independent and Sky News exposed the scandal, dozens of families have since launched legal bids against a group of children&#8217;s mental health hospistals &#8220;after the Independent exposed a culture of systematic abuse.&#8221; The Independent reported: &#8220;Solicitors at Hutcheon Law said they were receiving at least three negligence enquiries a week since The Independent revealed allegations of widespread abuse across multiple hospitals.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":13437,"template":"","published":[62],"region":[20],"class_list":["post-13435","case-studies","type-case-studies","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","published-62","region-national-campaigns"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v25.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>NHS Abuse Scandal - News Media Association<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/newsmediauk.org\/blog\/case-studies\/nhs-abuse-scandal\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_GB\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"NHS Abuse Scandal - News Media Association\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"A joint investigation from the Independent, spearheaded by their health correspondent, Rebecca Thomas, and Sky News&#8217;s Rob Mulhern, revealed an alarming number of cases of sexual abuse and assault within the UK&#8217;s psychiatric system. 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