Human Rights Report on Mexico Mental Health Abuse

Abandoned & Disappeared: Mexico’s Segregation and Abuse of Children and Adults with Disabilities is a report by Disability Rights International and the Comisión Méxicana de Defensa y Promoción de los Derechos Humano. Freedom Center co-founder and Madness Radio producer Will Hall is one of an international group of co-authors, and was part of the investigative team for the report, traveling to Mexico on an investigative mission in 2009.

Here’s an excerpt of what the recent coverage in the New York Times said:

Ten years ago, a human rights group released a scathing, groundbreaking report on abusive, decrepit conditions in Mexican institutions for the mentally and physically disabled, moving the country to promise change and to take the lead in writing international agreements to protect the disabled.

But in a new report released Tuesday, the group, Disability Rights International, working with a Mexican human rights organization, said a yearlong investigation revealed “atrocious and abusive conditions” that included lobotomies performed without consent, children missing from orphanages, widespread filth and squalor, and a lack of medical care.

You can read the report online here: http://www.disabilityrightsintl.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/Mex-Report-English-Nov30-finalpdf.pdf