Media release June 9, 2011: Major human rights issue in residental care.
Maltreatment of persons with disabilities in closed institutions or residential care is unacceptable. The European disability movement continues to lobby key decision makers in the field to end institutionalisation and promote community-based living.
The BBC's Panorama programme, shown on Tuesday 31 May, which highlighted the systematic abuse of people with learning disabilities, autism and personality disorder and in a residential care unit.The programme exposed a regime of routine unnecessary punishing, restraining and bullying of the institution’s residents.
Yannis Vardakastani, EDF President stressed: “For the European Disability Forum, the mistreatment of persons with disabilities in institutions is a grave issue. Those most in need of protection and care are locked away where their voices cannot be heard. The practices going on behind closed doors are inhumane. The undignified treatment persons with disabilities are often exposed to, is a dramatic violation of their human rights.”
Read the complete media release on major human rights issue in residental care here:
