Please help N. A. to be discharged from her enforced stay in hospital and, at last, be provided with the appropriate community treatment and support required under the law so that N. A. may live a life of freedom outside hospital.

N. A. is an autistic 17 year old girl who was on the waiting list of CAMHS for 16 months without any support. After this prolonged period without the regulation community care plan, she was then detained under the Mental Health Act - and has been kept in hospital against her will ever since (14 months and counting). She continues to be kept in a low secure unit in Birmingham - with the risk of being transferred to an adult hospital (a fourth hospital) when she turns 18. 

N. A. was a fully functioning individual before hospitalisation. She was a girl who was attending mainstream college every day, Saturday school,  arts, dance and theatre classes and the gym. She volunteered weekly at a charity shop and completed the intensive National Citizen Service 3-week programme. During hospitalisation, she was forcibly given medication and injected, was repeatedly restrained, had her belongings and clothes removed by staff, has often been in seclusion and has not been allowed to see her family at  certain visiting times - even though she desperately needed those visits. At present, only a total of 3 hours of family visiting time per week is allowed. 

Whilst in hospital against her will she started harming herself and, after months of hospitalisation, sometimes became violent to others under the influence of a heady cocktail of medication; four different 'heavy duty' drugs a day. She experienced serious side effects from this medication. After these many months of hospitalisation, she now sleeps most of the day and has lost interest in living - she has not been allowed to do any of her existing interests or hobbies such as arts and crafts, dancing and walking outdoors or seeing familiar faces regularly. She has not been out of the rooms of the hospital for months. It is quite frankly devastating the damage that the heavy-handed and often inhumane approach taken by the NHS has done to her. 

N. A. was discharged after 6 months from the first hospital without an after care plan in place - again contrary to regulations. The Local Authority did not provide any support and twice refused to provide N. A. with an Education and Healthcare Plan (EHCP). Being back in the community after half a year in hospital without psychological support and no opportunities for recovery, she was again detained at A&E and subsequently spent over 5 months at a PICU in Manchester - where they gave her one of the most dangerous medications for triggering cardiac arrest, despite the fact that she has a known heart murmur. 

Every year numerous autistic children are detained under the Mental Health Act in mental health hospitals for assessment or treatment. They usually detain these children - keeping them in hospital as there is no support in the community. This is against both the Mental Health Act Code of Practice and the Children Act. To date, N. A. has no other confirmed diagnosis apart from autism and has been seen by 5 different doctors. The treatment she has had enforced upon her is completely contrary to recognised guidance for helping autistic people and N. A. has been let down by a system that takes relatively healthy children and forcibly guides them through a managed journey of extreme distress and marked deterioration.

N. A. should be discharged immediately and a community care package put in place for her. This vulnerable young person has been waiting for the appropriate community care and support (according to the law and health regulations) since July 2016 and, instead of professionals providing that appropriate support, they instead deprive her of her liberty and enforce medication and isolation that has turned her into a shadow of her former self. They continue to have meetings and tribunals, and agree that she must stay in hospital despite their not having seen any improvement over the 14 months of hospitalisation - rather only deterioration of her mental and physical health.

Please sign this petition to help N. A. to get back her liberty and at last get the appropriate community treatment.

For more information about the appalling situation of thousands of autistic people who are detained in mental health hospitals please visit the National Autistic Society campaigning webpage: http://www.autism.org.uk/get-involved/media-centre/news/2018-11-16-atu-campaign.aspx