Mental patients still forced to live in ‘deplorable’ conditions

MORE than 1,400 mental health patients are continuing to live in inappropriate conditions in old psychiatric hospitals despite a damning report more than a year ago urging the Government to close them.

In a report by the Irish Psychiatric Association, conditions in the hospitals, including St Ita’s and St Brendan’s in Dublin, St Joesph’s in Co Limerick and St Senan’s in Co Wexford, were dubbed as “Dickensian, deplorable and appalling”.

However, little action has since been taken to move residents into community care.