Mental health provision for children delayed by outdated laws

OUTDATED mental health laws are resulting in some children not receiving the correct type of treatment quickly enough, a lawyer who has worked for the HSE said yesterday.

Sinead Kearney, partner and head of health services at legal health firm ByrneWallace, told the National Mental Health Conference in Dublin yesterday that the Mental Health Act of 2001 “needed to be redrafted”, as it presented difficulties with voluntary admissions of children who may have mental health issues.

Outlining ways in which the HSE can have powers of consent regarding the treatment of children, she said: “Children are being made to fit into the parameters of a law that was drafted with adults in mind. Arguably, the Act is deficient regarding voluntary admission.”