When a health carer becomes a torturer

On the 5th of March 2013 Juan E. Méndez, UN Special Rapporteur on torture called for an international debate on abuses related to health-care constituting torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.For this occasion the Special Rapporteur published his report deining several areas where torture may occure within the health-care settings.

Here is the summary:

The  present  report  focuses  on  certain  forms  of  abuses  in  health-care  settings  that may cross  a threshold  of  mistreatment  that  is  tantamount  to torture  or cruel,  inhuman or degrading  treatment  or punishment. It  identifies  the  policies  that  promote  these  practices and existing protection gaps.

By  illustrating  some  of  these  abusive  practices  in  health-care  settings,  the  report sheds light on often undetected forms of abusive practices that occur under the auspices of health-care policies, and emphasizes how certain treatments run afoul of the prohibition on torture  and  ill-treatment.  It identifies the scope of State's obligations to regulate, control and supervise  health-care  practices  with  a  view  to  preventing mistreatment  under  any pretext.

The  Special  Rapporteur  examines  a  number  of  the  abusive  practices  commonly reported  in health-care  settings  and  describes  how  the  torture  and  ill-treatment framework applies  in  this context. The  examples  of  torture  and  ill-treatment  in  health settings discussed likely represent a small fraction of this global problem.

What is of particular interest is that the Special Rapporteur makes express reference to judgments of the ECtHR e.g. R.R. v. Poland, P. and S. v. Poland and V.C. v. Slovakia an other relevant decisions of the Court.