ktlight
2nd June 2011, 07:02
FYI:
British police have launched an investigation into private hospitals after the revelation of shocking abuse at a care unit for mentally retarded people.
It was revealed that the staff at a unit run by one of the UK's prominent care companies were shockingly abusing people with learning disabilities, with footage showing patients being kicked, slapped and drenched with cold water, the dailyThe Guardian reported.
Police said they have detained three men and one woman as part of an ongoing probe into the case, adding that 13 employees have also been suspended.
The act at the Winterbourne View unit, in Hambrook, near Bristol, was exposed by the BBC Panorama programme, according to the report.
An undercover reporter was taken on as an unqualified support worker and filmed secretly for four weeks as some of his fellow workers routinely slapped and kicked patients, pinning them to the floor and drenching them with cold water, the report said.
The unit is purportedly an assessment hospital for adults with profound learning disabilities or autism, but most of the patients had lived there for more than a year - each at a cost of £3,500 a week to the public.
The chief executive of the company, Castlebeck, said he was ashamed of what had occurred in the unit.
Lee Reed said he was "personally ashamed" to be part of an organisation that allows such abuses and apologised unreservedly to the patients and their families.
Care services minister Paul Burstow, who was also shocked by the revelations, authorised a series of random, unannounced inspections of similar units by the Care Quality Commission (CQC), the sector regulator.
Critics of the government's NHS reforms will seize on the implications for the proposal to allow "any qualified provider" to supply healthcare in the same way as in social care, where private companies and charities dominate the market.
Source
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/182759.html
British police have launched an investigation into private hospitals after the revelation of shocking abuse at a care unit for mentally retarded people.
It was revealed that the staff at a unit run by one of the UK's prominent care companies were shockingly abusing people with learning disabilities, with footage showing patients being kicked, slapped and drenched with cold water, the dailyThe Guardian reported.
Police said they have detained three men and one woman as part of an ongoing probe into the case, adding that 13 employees have also been suspended.
The act at the Winterbourne View unit, in Hambrook, near Bristol, was exposed by the BBC Panorama programme, according to the report.
An undercover reporter was taken on as an unqualified support worker and filmed secretly for four weeks as some of his fellow workers routinely slapped and kicked patients, pinning them to the floor and drenching them with cold water, the report said.
The unit is purportedly an assessment hospital for adults with profound learning disabilities or autism, but most of the patients had lived there for more than a year - each at a cost of £3,500 a week to the public.
The chief executive of the company, Castlebeck, said he was ashamed of what had occurred in the unit.
Lee Reed said he was "personally ashamed" to be part of an organisation that allows such abuses and apologised unreservedly to the patients and their families.
Care services minister Paul Burstow, who was also shocked by the revelations, authorised a series of random, unannounced inspections of similar units by the Care Quality Commission (CQC), the sector regulator.
Critics of the government's NHS reforms will seize on the implications for the proposal to allow "any qualified provider" to supply healthcare in the same way as in social care, where private companies and charities dominate the market.
Source
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/182759.html