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Children in mental health crisis waiting up to three days in A&E for specialist bed in England

Children and young people in England having a mental health crisis are spending up to three days in an A&E unit before they get a bed in a specialist unit, NHS figures reveal.

One children’s nurse who works in an emergency department said such long waits for under-18s who were in acute distress were “frankly barbaric” but “becoming far more normal”.

Some of those who end up stuck in A&E become so troubled and disruptive that staff are increasingly using medication to sedate them to manage their behaviour.

The Royal College of Nursing (RCN) said the delays highlighted a “catastrophic system-wide failure” by NHS mental health services to intervene to stop school-age children ending up in crisis. Seeking help at A&E was often “damaging and potentially traumatising” for them, it said.

One A&E nurse said such long waits were “extremely distressing” for the patients involved and for the staff looking after them. Another said: “A&E is just seen as this big receptacle for all children who are dysregulated or in crisis. But A&E is not respite for children with mental health concerns. It can often exacerbate their trauma.”

Dr Sam Jones, the research officer for mental health at the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health (RCPCH), said children in mental health crisis were now often more unwell than in the past.

“Alongside rising levels of poor mental health, the nature of need is changing fast. Problems are more complex and severe, more younger children are affected and rates of self-harm and eating disorders continue to rise,” Jones said.

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Source: The Guardian, 20 May 2026

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Children in mental health crisis spent more than 900,000 hours in A&E in England

Children suffering mental health crises spent more than 900,000 hours in A&E in England last year seeking urgent and potentially life-saving help, NHS figures reveal.

Experts said the huge amount of time under-18s with mental health issues were spending in A&E was “simply astounding” and showed that NHS services for that vulnerable age group were inadequate.

Children as young as three and four years old are among those ending up in emergency departments because of mental health problems, according to data obtained by Labour.

Dr Rosena Allin-Khan, the shadow mental health minister, who is also an A&E doctor, said: “With nowhere to turn, children with a mental illness are left to deteriorate and reach crisis point – at which time A&E is the only place left for them to go. Emergency departments are incredibly unsuitable settings for children in crisis, yet we’re witnessing increasingly younger children having to present to A&E in desperation.”

Young people who endured long A&E waits included those with depression, psychosis and eating disorders as well as some who had self-harmed or tried to kill themselves, doctors said.

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Source: The Guardian, 9 February 2023

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Children in England at clear risk ‘cannot get mental health bed’

Young people in the midst of a mental health crisis need to have attempted suicide several times before they get a bed in an inpatient unit in England, a report has revealed.

Admission criteria for beds in child and adolescent mental health units are now so tight that even very vulnerable under-18s who pose a clear risk to themselves cannot get one.

The practice – caused by the NHS’s lack of mental health beds – leaves young people at risk of further harm, their parents confused, exhausted and worried, and the police and ambulance services potentially having to step in.

The high thresholds for admission to a child and adolescent mental health services (Camhs) unit are detailed in a report on NHS mental health care for under-18s in England based on interviews with patients, their parents and specialist staff who look after them.

The report says a young person has to “have attempted suicide multiple times to be offered inpatient support”.

Olly Parker, the head of external affairs at the charity Young Minds, said: “It is shameful that children and young people are reaching crisis point before they get any support for their mental health. We know from our own research that thousands have waited so long for mental health support or treatment that they have attempted to take their own life.

“Those who end up in A&E are often there because they don’t know where else to turn. But A&E can be a crowded and stressful environment, and is usually not the best place to get appropriate help.”

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Source: The Guardian, 18 January 2023

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Children harmed by mental health service failings

Young people cared for by an NHS mental health service "came to harm" because of its failings, inspectors said.

The care provided by Essex Partnership University NHS Foundation Trust (EPUT) has been rated "inadequate" by the Care Quality Commission (CQC). It has now been stopped from admitting new patients after inspectors found "serious concerns" in the children and adolescent mental health services.

EPUT said it had increased staffing levels and had been coaching staff.

The inspection was prompted by a serious incident and concerning information received about safety and quality, the CQC said.

Inspectors visited, unannounced, in May and June and looked at the Larkwood and Longview wards at the St Aubyn Centre in Colchester and the Poplar Adolescent Unit at Rochford Hospital.

The CQC found observations were not always carried out safely and patients "had been harmed as a result of the poor practices", which included patients self-harming.

It said these incidents were not always reported or dealt with appropriately.

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Source: BBC News, 15 September 2021

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Children harmed by decision to redeploy health visitors, Covid inquiry hears

A decision by the NHS to redeploy health visitors during the pandemic was "fundamentally flawed" and "children were harmed" as a result, the head of a health visiting charity has told the Covid inquiry.

Many health visitors were sent to work in other parts of the NHS at the beginning of the pandemic.

Alison Morton, CEO of the Institute of Health Visiting, told the inquiry it was "inappropriate" as they "were needed most on their own front line".

NHS England's Chief Nursing Officer Duncan Burton told the inquiry its response to safeguarding did not stop throughout the pandemic despite staff being diverted to critical services.

Health visitors in almost two thirds of trusts in England were redeployed in March 2020, according to research by University College London.

The intention was that they would go to work in hospitals to support acutely ill patients but some were sent to do administration, to deliver parcels and to answer telephones, the inquiry heard.

Some health visitors who remained in post were left with case loads of 750 children or more, way above the recommended 250, evidence provided by Prof Catherine Davies, of Leeds University, to the inquiry showed.

"We let families down", Ms Morton told the inquiry, saying protection was not afforded to babies and that "some children paid the highest price".

The inquiry was shown research by the child safeguarding review practice panel which identified Covid adaptions, such as virtual visits as opposed to home visits by health visitors, as factors in the deaths and serious incidents of some children.

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Source: BBC News, 8 October 2025

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Children getting ‘conveyor belt’ care due to waiting list pressure

The pressure to tackle long waiting lists in children’s community services is impacting care quality, clinical leaders have warned.

It comes after community health services waiting list figures were published for the first time by NHS England last week.

They revealed more than 200,000 children were waiting, of whom 12,000 had been waiting more than a year, and 65,000 more than 18 weeks. While adult community services lists have been coming down fairly steadily since the autumn, children’s services are failing to make progress.

The children’s services with the longest lists are community paediatrics (which mostly deals with neurological development issues such as autism and ADHD), speech and language therapy, and children’s occupational therapy.

Specialists in those areas told HSJ it was the result of staffing gaps, rising and more complex demand, Covid backlog, and years of underfunding.

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Source: HSJ, 20 March 2023

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Children detained under Mental Health Act held for hours in A&E departments

Children as young as nine detained under the Mental Health Act are spending hours in NHS accident and emergency departments under police control rather than in specialist mental health assessment suites.

The detention under the act of children in England and Wales in police cells was banned in 2017 but a lack of suitable options has led to the use of A&E departments.

Research to be presented at a British Sociological Association conference at Northumbria University on Friday found that 187 nine-to-18-year-olds were detained under the act in a single constituency in the north of England between 2017 and 2021. Three-quarters were taken to A&E, where legally they could wait for up to 24 hours, accompanied by police officers, until they were assessed.

It was mainly children aged 16 and over who were able to access adult facilities who were taken to specialist suites under the care of trained mental health staff.

The author of the research, Dr Jayne Erlam, of Liverpool John Moores University, will tell the conference: “What is clear is that the youngest detained do not gain access to specialist suites and instead are taken to A&E.

“Taking into consideration that the person has been detained because of mental distress, such a public environment under the gaze of others can do nothing to alleviate any distress. The public nature of A&E departments is concerning, and police officers are fiercely against the use of them as a place of safety.

“Shortfalls in health and social care provision increase police contact with persons experiencing mental distress to the point where there is a reliance on policing to bridge gaps and to safeguard people who are at risk of future episodes of acute mental distress.”

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Source: The Guardian, 12 September 2025

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Children born thanks to IVF pioneer find their biological father is scientist from his lab

Questions have been raised about one of the UK’s most well-known fertility doctors after two people whose parents attended his clinic reportedly made the shock discovery that their biological father is a lab scientist who worked in the same hospital as the physician.

Patrick Steptoe, who died in 1988, was an obstetrician and gynaecologist who helped develop in vitro fertilisation (IVF) and ran a fertility clinic in Oldham Hospital, Greater Manchester.

The parents of Roz Snyder, 52, and David Gertler, 51, attended the clinic around the 1970s after struggling to conceive children.

Ms Snyder and Mr Gertler were shocked after DNA tests revealed they are half-siblings, the Telegraph reported.

The pair were recently alerted by the genealogy website Ancestry that their late fathers are not their biological ones, but that they shared a biological father in Roy Hollihead, who ran a pathology laboratory one floor above Dr Steptoe’s clinic.

The 84-year-old told Ms Snyder that Dr Steptoe “used sperm from lab staff, medical students and doctors… but no records of any were kept” and told the Telegraph that he was not sure the hospital was aware of the apparent scheme.

Northern Care Alliance, the NHS trust that now runs Oldham Hospital, said it had no records of Dr Steptoe’s clinic, according to the Telegraph.

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Source: The Independent, 23 December 2024

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Children bearing brunt of ‘terrifying’ coronavirus mental health crisis

Britain is facing a “terrifying” mental health crisis with tens of thousands more children needing specialist help since the start of the coronavirus pandemic.

Experts from the Royal College of Psychiatrists have warned the problem facing the country will get worse before it gets better with new analysis revealing almost 400,000 children and 2.2 million adults sought help for mental health problems during the crisis.

While the effect of lockdown and coronavirus has affected people of all ages, children appear to be particularly susceptible.

Some 80,226 more children and young people were referred to specialist mental health services between April and December last year, up by 28% on the same months in 2019 to 372,438.

Dr Bernadka Dubicka, chairwoman of the child and adolescent faculty at the Royal College of Psychiatrists, said: "Our children and young people are bearing the brunt of the mental health crisis caused by the pandemic and are at risk of lifelong mental illness."

"As a frontline psychiatrist I've seen the devastating effect that school closures, disrupted friendships and the uncertainty caused by the pandemic have had on the mental health of our children and young people."

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Source: 9 April, 2021

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Children at similar risk for Long Covid as adults, study suggests

A large study today from Germany shows that children and adolescents are at the same relative risk of experiencing COVID-19 symptoms 90 days or more after acute infection as adults are, according to findings in PLOS Medicine.

Though kids and adolescents have far fewer deaths or severe outcomes from COVID-19 infections compared to adults, little is known about Long or post-Covid symptoms in this age-group, or symptoms that persist for more than 12 weeks after acute infection.

Researchers from the Technical University of Dresden, Germany, used data from half of the German population to determine that kids and adults have the same relative risk of experiencing post-Covid symptoms at 90 days following infection.

Martin Roessler, the lead author of the study, said there were significant symptom overlap among kids and adults who experienced symptoms 90 days or more after acute infection.

"We found 5 identical outcomes among the 10 outcomes with the highest relative risk among children/adolescents and adults. These symptoms are cough, fever, headache, malaise/fatigue/exhaustion, throat or chest pain," he told CIDRAP News.

Other symptoms were more commonly seen in adults, but not kids. Those included a loss of taste or smell, fever, and shortness of breath.

Daniel Blatt, MD, a pediatric infectious disease physician at the post-COVID clinic at Norton Children's Hospital in Louisville, Kentucky, said he was not surprised by the study's findings.

"It's unclear if Long Covid is the same in children and adults, in terms of pathophysiology, but it's just as real," he said. Blatt, who was not involved in the study, said his clinic also collects data on children and Long Covid. He said the most common symptoms reported in his patients are fatigue, anxiety, and "brain fog," followed by some shortness of breath or muscle pain.

"The good news is kids tend to get better, regardless of what intervention is needed," Blatt said. As in adult Long Covid, there's no one-size-fits-all approach for pediatric Long Covid patients. "Some need reassurance; some need a graduated exercise program."

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Source: CIDRAP, 10 November 2022

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Children as young as four could be offered tablets as part of NHS cost-cutting drive

The NHS could save tens of thousands of pounds per patient each year by prescribing tablets instead of liquid medicine to children with a particular medical condition, experts have revealed.

Researchers at Great Ormond Street Hospital (Gosh) found that patients as young as seven were not only able to successfully transition to pills but often expressed a clear preference for them over the taste of their liquid medicine.

The study focused on children suffering from congenital hyperinsulinism (CHI), a condition characterised by elevated insulin levels that necessitate regular, often multiple daily, doses of diazoxide to maintain stable blood sugar.

Until now, this vital treatment has predominantly been administered in liquid form, with liquid diazoxide costing a significant £15.50 per 50mg.

Experts have estimated that switching from liquid to tablets could save the NHS £40,000 per patient per year.

Jess Manktelow, who has CHI and has been a Gosh patient since she was 15 months old, was one of the children who took part in the project.

The 11-year-old, from Kent, was switched to diazoxide tablets in April 2025.

“It has made a big difference taking medicine that doesn’t taste horrible,” she added.

“There were times where I didn’t want to take it because of the taste.

“It makes things very easy for me now, I’m able to do it myself and it doesn’t take up as much time at school or when I’m doing things I like, like climbing, it doesn’t have as much impact and that makes me happy.”

Kate Morgan, Gosh clinical nurse specialist who co-led the project, said: “We knew the potential this trial had for savings, but the scale of the quality-of-life improvements for children and their families we are seeing is something we didn’t anticipate.

“Children are so much more than their diagnoses – they have full lives and families and their illnesses affects everyone, so it is very important we do all we can to make simple, positive changes that impact everyone for the better.”

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Source: The Independent, 10 April 2026

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Children 'self-harming in hospital' after family visits banned

Young people with learning disabilities are being driven to self-harm after being prevented from seeing their families during the coronavirus lockdown in breach of their human rights, a new report finds.

The Joint Committee on Human Rights warned that the situation for children and young people in mental health hospitals had reached the point of “severe crisis” during the pandemic due to unlawful blanket bans on visits, the suspension of routine inspections and the increased use of restraint and solitary confinement.

The report concluded that while young inpatients' human rights were already being breached before the pandemic, the coronavirus lockdown has put them at greater risk – and called on the NHS to instruct mental health hospitals to resume visits.

It highlighted cases in which young people had been driven to self-harm, including Eddie, a young man with a learning disability whose mother, Adele Green, had not been able to visit him since 14 March.

“When the lockdown came, it was quite quick in the sense that the hospital placed a blanket ban on anybody going in and anybody going out,” said Ms Green. “Within a week, with the fear and anxiety, he tried to take his own life, which really blew us away. We were mortified.”

The Committee is urging NHS England to write to all hospitals, including private ones, stating they must allow visits unless there is a specific reason relating to an individual case why it would not be safe, and said the Care Quality Commission (CQC) should be responsible for ensuring national guidance is followed.

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Source: The Independent, 12 June 2020

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Childhood, interrupted: 12-year-old Toby’s life with Long Covid

In the latest Office for National Statistics survey, published in April, 111,816 children (aged three to 17) in England and Scotland were estimated to be suffering from Long Covid during the four-week period ending 7 March. More than 20,000 of these children have found their ability to undertake day-to-day activities has been “limited a lot”. For Toby, it has meant pain, crushing fatigue and sadness – as well as months off school.

Dr Binita Kane is a Manchester-based consultant respiratory physician with a special interest in Long Covid. Her experience comes from being a doctor treating patients with Long Covid and also being the mother of a girl with Long Covid.

She says that the 2 million people struggling with Long Covid in England and Scotland have created a massive challenge for the health service. The model for post-Covid services was set up in 2020, and in terms of scale and pace the UK was ahead of the game then. But things have moved on and the NHS hasn’t kept up. “The NHS is a juggernaut,” Kane says. “It cannot change things in a rapid way unless you put the weight of everything behind it, like we did in acute Covid.”

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Source: The Guardian, 12 June 2024

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Childbirth: Mum left feeling dirty by incontinence injuries

"It's isolating, debilitating and you feel dirty."

Too many women have to cope with bowel incontinence from injuries during childbirth, according to one charity.

Anna Clements, from Masic, said stigma and a lack of information meant women were unaware of the medical support available.

The Welsh government said a plan would be published in the summer on how health boards should provide "high-quality women's health services".

A coalition of charities said this was one of a number of ways women experience poor health outcomes.

Women need to be listened to and not just dismissed and told 'this happens with birth - just get on with it'," added Ms Clements.

Masic supports women who have experienced anal sphincter injuries - an issue which carries so much stigma that few will speak to anyone about their symptoms.

Julie Cornish, a colorectal surgeon, was instrumental in setting up a hub which helps patients with pelvic organ prolapse, incontinence and bowel dysfunction.

"These are really common conditions - they mainly affect women, but can affect men as well," she said.

Clinics for things such as bowel, bladder or gynaecological issues are held simultaneously in the hub, based at Barry Hospital, Vale of Glamorgan. This means patients can get immediate advice from different specialists without joining separate waiting lists which cuts waiting times significantly.

Ms Cornish acknowledged the numbers currently seeking help were "the tip of the iceberg" because of the stigma.

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Source: BBC News, 28 May 2022

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Child's hospital death 'linked to contaminated water'

A whistleblower claimed a cancer patient died as a result of contaminated water at Scotland's largest hospital. The whistleblower raised concerns about the findings of a review into infections in child cancer patients.

Jeane Freeman, the health secretary, says she knew in September a child had died after contracting an infection possibly linked to water at the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital, but did not make it public. She told BBC Scotland she acted on the information but chose to maintain patient confidentiality.

Ms Freeman said she felt for the child's parents. She said: "I deeply regret not only the death of their child. In any circumstance that has to cause a pain that I can't possibly imagine, but I also deeply regret that they feel they haven't been given the information that they have a perfect right to receive and are entitled to. They have my commitment to act to ensure that situation does not happen to parents in the future".

"I don't regret honouring patient confidentiality. But upholding patient confidentiality does not mean I don't act on the information I am given."

Labour MSP Anas Sarwar had raised the issue - which was brought to light by an NHS whistleblower - during First Minister's Questions on Thursday. He  described the situation as a "cover-up".

The MSP said he had seen information which showed that senior managers were repeatedly alerted to the fact a previous review failed to include cases of infection related to the water supply in 2017. He said the parents of the child had never been told the true cause of their child's death.

Greater Glasgow Health Board say a link between the infection and the hospital cannot be proven because regulations at the time did not require water testing.

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Source: BBC News, 14 November 2019

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Child winter respiratory illness on rise in summer

Owing to social distancing and a lack of exposure, childhood respiratory illness, RSV is on the rise, according to reports and parents are being warned to look out for signs and symptoms. 

"This winter, we expect levels of common seasonal illnesses such as cold and flu to increase, as people mix more and given that fewer people will have built up natural immunity during the pandemic. Children under two are at a particular risk of severe infections from common seasonal illnesses," Public Health England, medical director Dr Yvonne Doyle has said. 

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Source: BBC News, 23 July 2021

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Child spent two months in A&E

A child spent more than two months in A&E following a breakdown of a care placement, in what the trust described as “one of the longest waits we’ve seen”.

Barking, Havering and Redbridge University Hospitals Trust said the young person was at its Queen’s Hospital A&E for more than 70 days, while another was there for more than 30.

They were both under the care of councils “outside our area”, and their care placements had broken down, the trust said. It has declined to say which councils.

Both children had “complex behavioural needs” which meant they could not be moved on to children’s wards, the east London trust said. Speaking last week, it said the children had recently moved on to other placements.

The trust has previously highlighted long waits for children under care at Queen’s A&E – including a wait of 44 days in 2024 – and said care placement breakdowns were the most common reason.

Trust CEO Matthew Trainer said: “We’re seen as a place of safety for children and young people with mental health issues and/or challenging behavioural needs. This means several young people have experienced long waits for the right support in A&E.

“It’s unacceptable and distressing for both patients and our staff, and something we’ve been discussing at our board meetings for several years, as well as working with mental health trusts and councils to see how we can reduce delays.”

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Source: HSJ, 9 April 2026

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Child spent 44 days in A&E waiting for care placement

A child spent more than a month ‘stuck in a room with the lights on’ in an accident and emergency department, a trust has revealed.

The child waited 44 days, while another child spent more than 11 days in the emergency department while waiting for a local authority placement, according to Matthew Trainer, CEO of Barking, Havering and Redbridge University Hospital. Both had mental health needs and/or learning disabilities.

Mr Trainer said the next longest recent stays in ED were two adult mental health patients, who spent 82 hours and 46 hours waiting for mental health beds.

The trust would not share more information on the cases due to the risk of identifying the patients, but said that the most common reason for long waits for children was that they are under the care of local authorities, often due to conditions related to neurodiversity, and waiting for a suitable care placement/accommodation, rather than an NHS bed.

Lesley Seary, a BHRUT non-executive director, said at the trust’s board meeting last week: “It’s both distressing for [the children] and distressing for the staff. Although in some cases, they see it as a place of safety, which is slightly depressing but good that we are at least seen as a place of safety.

“I just wonder, are our local authority colleagues doing all they can and understanding enough? I appreciate the difficulties they have in finding the right kind of accommodation. 

“We’re probably safer than some other places could be, but it just does not feel right that a young person was stuck in a room in A&E with the lights on all the time because we can’t find an alternative.”

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Source: HSJ, 11 September 2024

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Child referrals for mental health care in England up 39% in a year

The number of children in England needing treatment for serious mental health problems has risen by 39% in a year, official data shows.

Experts say the pandemic, social inequality, austerity and online harm are all fuelling a crisis in which NHS mental health treatment referrals for under-18s have increased to more than 1.1m in 2021-22.

In 2020-21 – the first year of the pandemic – the figure was 839,570, while in 2019-20 there were 850,741 referrals, according to analysis of official figures by the PA Media.

The figures include children who are suicidal, self-harming, suffering serious depression or anxiety, and those with eating disorders.

Dr Elaine Lockhart, chair of the child and adolescent psychiatry faculty at the Royal College of Psychiatrists, said the rise in referrals reflected a “whole range” of illnesses.

She said “specialist services are needing to respond to the most urgent and the most unwell”, including young people suffering from psychosis, suicidal thoughts and severe anxiety disorder.

Lockhart said targets for seeing children urgently with eating disorders were sliding “completely” and that more staff were needed.

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Source: The Guardian, 3 January 2023

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Child mortality from trauma and sudden death rising in England, study shows

Child mortality from trauma and sudden unexpected death increased last year, according to figures highlighting the stark impact of poverty on child health.

The analysis, which tracked all child deaths in England between 2019 and 2022, found overall mortality dipped during the pandemic due to a decrease in infectious illnesses, but that numbers of deaths have since returned to pre-pandemic levels. This included a 32% increase in trauma deaths and a 13% rise in sudden unexpected death in infancy or childhood (Sudic) last year compared with pre-pandemic rates.

Prof Karen Luyt, the programme lead for the National Child Mortality Database, based at the University of Bristol, said the figures could be “the first mortality signal” from families struggling with the cost of living crisis.

“This is worrying and I think we’re likely to see things getting worse,” she said. “Certainly for childhood illness and mortality, we know there’s a strong social gradient and we know that more families are now living in poverty.”

Sudic deaths are defined as being unexplained and unexpected at the point death is registered, but may be subsequently found to be due to cardiac arrest after infection or an asthma attack, for instance. It is a broader category than sudden infant death syndrome (Sids), where the cause of death often remains a mystery even after postmortem examination.

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Source: The Guardian, 16 January 2023

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Child health checks failed to recover after covid, figures show

Inadequate health visiting provision has led to gaps in care for children and heaped pressure on acute services, senior clinicians have told HSJ. 

Government data suggests that a fifth of infants are not receiving one or more of their five mandatory health visiting reviews across the first two years of life, with rates still substantially below pre-covid levels.

Meanwhile, nationally about 1 in 10 children are still being seen virtually, contrary to the government’s delivery model and despite clinicians saying in-person contact is vital to spotting problems. Senior figures in children’s services told HSJ that in some areas a much higher rate was still being carried out with no in-person contact.

Clinicians said the reasons were ongoing funding and staffing constraints, and that the problems were leading to parents turning to emergency departments and GPs instead.

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Source: HSJ, 20 April 2023

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Child dies as measles cases surge at Liverpool hospital

A child with measles has died at a Liverpool hospital.

The individual was being treated at Alder Hey Children's Hospital after becoming ill with measles and other health problems.

It comes as the NHS hospital said it is "concerned" about the increasing number of children and young people who are contracting the highly contagious virus.

It said it has treated 17 cases of the effects and complications of measles since June.

"We are concerned about the increasing number of children and young people who are contracting measles. Measles is a highly contagious viral illness which can cause children to be seriously unwell, requiring hospital treatment, and in rare cases, death," the hospital said in a statement to Sky News.

In a separate open letter to parents and carers in Merseyside earlier this month, Alder Hey, along with the UK Health and Security Agency (UKHSA) and directors of Public Health for Liverpool, Sefton and Knowsley, warned the increase in measles in the region could be down to fewer people getting vaccinated.

The letter read: "We are seeing more cases of measles in our children and young people because fewer people are having the MMR vaccine, which protects against measles and two other viruses called mumps and rubella.

"Children in hospital, who are very poorly for another reason, are at higher risk of catching the virus."

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Source: Sky News, 13 July 2025

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Child died at mental health hospital ‘while staff were meant to be watching her’

A 14-year-old girl who should have been under constant supervision at a mental health hospital died after a member of staff on his first shift left her unattended, an inquest has heard.

Ruth Szymankiewicz died at Taplow Manor Hospital in Maidenhead on 12 February 2022 after a care worker responsible for her one-to-one supervision “sporadically” left his post, the hearing was told.

It also emerged at the hearing that the care worker, who is now abroad, was allegedly using a fake name. Detectives are investigating him as part of a fraud investigation although he has not yet been interviewed by police.

After Ruth’s death, the Care Quality Commission launched a criminal investigation. In an update to the coroner, it said that the investigation was looking at whether the provider had “brought about avoidable harm or exposure to risk” in relation to the young girl’s death.

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Source: The Independent, 26 May 2023

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Child diabetes referrals in England and Wales jump 50% amid obesity crisis

The number of children being treated at paediatric diabetes units (PDUs) in England and Wales has increased by more than 50% amid a “perfect storm” of rising obesity levels and the cost of living crisis, health leaders have said.

Diabetes UK said alarming obesity levels among children had led to a “concerning climb” in the number diagnosed with type 2 diabetes, and predicted that the cost of living crisis could lead to further problems in the years to come.

Data from NHS Digital shows that almost one in seven children start primary school obese – a rise of almost 50% in just a year. More than a quarter are obese by the time they finish primary school.

The high levels of obesity combined with the squeeze on personal finances are creating a “perfect storm which risks irreversible harm to the health of young people”, Diabetes UK said. It accused the government of “letting our children down” as it called for concerted action to tackle obesity.

Chris Askew, the chief executive of Diabetes UK, said: “We are very concerned that this spike in childhood obesity will translate into an even greater increase in children with type 2 diabetes in the coming years, a crisis fuelled by longstanding health inequalities and made worse still by impacts of the cost of living crisis."

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Source: The Guardian, 15 June 2022

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Child deaths expose mental health unit pressures

Deaths, staff shortages and a culture of life-threatening self-harm are exposing deep fears about the quality of mental health care in hospitals for children and young people.

Since 2019, at least 20 patients aged 18 or under have died in NHS or privately-run units, the BBC has found.

A further 26 have died within a year of leaving units, amid claims of a lack of ongoing community support.

The NHS said it had "invested record amounts... to meet record demand".

Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) units look after about 4,000 patients with many different diagnoses each year. The aim is to help them recover over a period of weeks or months through specialist care. Some patients are in and out of the units for years.

The BBC has also heard serious claims regarding the unsafe discharge of patients sent home from CAMHS hospitals.

Several former patients told the BBC they had serious self-harm incidents or tried to take their own life within days of returning home.

Parents have described being on "suicide watch" 24 hours a day, to ensure their child's safety.

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Source: BBC News, 9 August 2022

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