Parents too scared to seek Medical Help for their seriously ill Children

See this all - too - familiar horror story about parents of seriously ill children being threatened with their forcible removal and being put into "care". It is a nightmare our family knows all too well. Since when is caring for your sick child wrong / abusive / unloving / uncaring?? Why should someone outside the family be allowed to impose and enforce their different opinions on a family, backed up by the Police and the Courts?

The illness I'm referring to is M.E. Parents who see that exercise programs are making their child's condition worse and therefore stop it are having Social Workers turn up on their doorstep threatening forcible removal of the child, who would then be put in a clinically dangerous place, like a psychiatric ward where they would be forced to exercise. One such hospital faked a 'fire alarm' and made the child run UPSTAIRS! They also threw him into a pool to see if he would swim and save himself. He couldn't, even though he had been a good swimmer before his illness.

There is plenty of evidence that aerobic exercise is the worst thing an ME sufferer can do as it always makes matters worse. Sometime irreversibly so. The only ME treatment so far that never harms and in the vast majority of cases helps is the management technique called Pacing.

Can you imagine the torment of having your beloved child snatched, and know that you need to protect your child from harm and you are prevented from doing so? For one of their little techniques is to deny all contact until the parents "can co-operate with Professionals". That means no phone calls, no cards, no letters, no parcels. No contact at all. Its useless to try to send them because they are intercepted, read and filed, with the child never seeing them. Neither do they explain to the child that it is by their orders that contact with the family is severed. All the sick child knows is that they are in a scary place where they are being treated harshly and being made to do things that are harmful him. He would long for his family - perhaps cry for his mother - and never know why they didn't come to him when he needed them most.

That is the nature of the poisoned chalice of "Help and Protection" by Social Services".

And when that vulnerable child suffers grave harm, the doctors and social workers get off scot free. Nobody successfully calls them to account for their harmful actions. Some patients even DIE due to the "help" forced on them. One such person was Sophia Mirza. On postmortem her spinal cord was found to be inflamed and the pathologists were of the opinion that the degree of inflammation would have caused agonising pain. Yet she was not believed and the door of her mother's flat was beaten down for "them" to take her away to a psychiatric hospital. Sophia never recovered. Her mother, Criona, set up a website that has all the documents in the case on it. See for yourselves. The website is HERE

And the story I'm having a rant about is on Newsnet Scotland, and it is headlined:
Parents of sick children living in fear
Click HERE to go to the shameful and disgraceful story. Here is the first paragraph of it:

"Watching a child suffer every day at the hands of a chronic, disabling illness is heartbreaking for any parent. Imagine then, what it’s like to be blamed for your child’s illness and threatened with social services.


This is the reality for many families caring for a child suffering from myalgic encephalomyelitis, known as ME or chronic fatigue syndrome. In fact, the number of parents in the UK being threatened by doctors who say they will report families to child protection agencies has doubled in the last year.


The Association of Young People with ME (AYME), the UK’s leading charity supporting young people with ME, claim hundreds of families already scarred by the illness live in fear that their child will be removed from their care.

Chief Executive Mary-Jane Willows said they have seen a dramatic rise in calls from parents this year. “Most families feel under threat at some point and that is hugely significant. Just one threat is one too many. Hauling families through child protection proceedings on the basis of unfounded threat just adds to fear and anxiety for these families.”

The first ever biomedical research into ME in children published last year by the University of Dundee concluded that the physical symptoms of ME in children can be just as disabling as multiple sclerosis. The child’s quality of life is considerably worse.

“Professionals often think of it as a psychological problem, prescribe the wrong treatments and make the child worse. Then families are accused of causing the damage, it’s ghastly.

Fifteen year old Leanne Murray has severe ME and struggles with a range of unpredictable symptoms of ME including nausea, muscle pains, post exertion fatigue and light sensitivity.

When Lorraine took her to hospital with chest pains, doctors said there was nothing they could do. Leanne was sent home with no treatment and the consultant reported her mum to social services.

A week later a social worker arrived on their doorstep in Coatbridge. Now the family fear taking their daughter to hospital again.

Leanne was terrified by the experience. “I am used to doctors not believing that ME is a real illness. But that was really frightening. It was bad enough they did nothing to help me. It was worse knowing what they had done afterwards.”
 
The Chief Medical Officers in England and Scotland both concede that disagreement about a child’s treatment is not sufficient grounds for child protection. Dr Nigel Speight, retired paediatrician and medical advisor to the TYMES Trust has over twenty years experience working with children who have ME. He has represented families in twenty three child protection cases across the UK and regularly comes to Scotland to support families.

“Professionals must realise that parents have the right to make decisions about whether to undertake treatments that can be responsible for marked deterioration in severe cases,” said Dr Speight.

Claire's  thirteen year old son Neil* was diagnosed with ME at age ten and now he rarely gets out of the house. He weighs just over six stone. Claire said the attitudes of hospital consultants changed after she removed Neil from a prescribed exercise programme which she believed caused him to relapse.

“The doctor asked me what I thought social workers would say if they found out I had got him a wheelchair. Then a consultant asked me if I had heard of Münchausen by proxy."

Read and weep.

And if you are a vulnerable family reading this, my best advice is to take your sick child and move away from the EU, and go somewhere in Africa, Mauritius, India, Seychelles or the Philippines or any of a number of countries where they are either more enlightened or have less barbaric practices.