Tomorrow's "Independent" Editorial Today

Yesterday we reported on the shocking institutional abuse of disabled patients in NHS care homes throughout Cornwall. Once again, a supposedly caring and civilised society turns out to hide shameful treatment of its most vulnerable members.

Take David, for example (not his real name). He suffers from cerebral palsy and was cared for in the Tintagel ward of the newly-built (and award-winning) Ley Line Hospital. What should have been a caring, supportive environment was in fact a waking nightmare of emotional and physical abuse, for which no staff have yet been called to account.

There is action the Government could take which would eliminate such abuses. Compulsory scanning and tests for all expectant mothers would detect the vast majority of the infirmities with which people like David are afflicted. These could then be treated in the womb by compulsory termination. In an age when millions of so-called 'healthy' foetuses are, quite properly, discarded, surely it is an anachronism to allow parents freely to give birth to those who would really be better off dead.


Tomorrow - Our Shame - Why Britain Is Still Discriminating Against The Disabled