Hospital apologizes in starvation death of man with DS
January 12th, 2009
From the [UK] Guardian, [UK] Daily Mail, BBC, [UK] Daily Mail:
A hospital in South West London that allowed a 43-year-old man with Down syndrome to starve to death in its care has apologized to his family for the man’s “inexcusable” treatment.
Martin Ryan (left) had a stroke in 2005 which left him unable to swallow. He was not fitted with a feeding tube, and died after being without food or water for 26 days.
With a government ombudsman expected to rule on the case later this month, the disability charity Mencap called on the government to condemn the failings of the UK’s National Health Service (NHS) in caring for people with learning disabilities.
Mencap highlighted Ryan’s case and five others in a March 2007 report called Death By Indifference. The charity said the six cases demonstrated that there was institutional discrimination within the NHS against people with learning disabilities.
(Photo from the [UK] Daily Mail)
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See also an op-ed by columnist Deborah Orr in the [UK] Independent: The shocking price to be paid by those not perfect enough to be treated
An excerpt:
… Despite all the evidence to the contrary over many years, the medical profession is highly resistant to the idea that there is institutional discrimination against disabled people within the health service.
Sadly, for the parents of children with disabilities, this is quite obvious. What haunts many of them, as they struggle to provide care for the children, is what will happen when they are no longer around to provide advocacy. These paralyzing fears, it is now perfectly obvious, are well founded.
Earlier story:
Disabled ‘face suffering in NHS’ — BBC, July 29, 2008 – Independent inquiry calls for inspections, more training in wake of Mencap report
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