Joan Bellingham speaking at the Abuse in Care Royal Commission of Inquiry, which is investigating state and faith-based care between 1950 and 1999. Photo / Supplied
EDITORIAL
In past days, we have heard some of the most appalling testimony from the Abuse in Care Royal Commission Inquiry.
Joan Bellingham was put in hospital care for more than 12 years and subjected to electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) in excess of 200 times - for being a lesbian. She
told the inquiry the struggle for redress was "almost as bad as the original abuse".
One survivor, who testified under a nom de plume, was at Manawaroa Unit and Lake Alice Hospital, where he was sexually, physically and psychologically abused in his early teens during the 1970s. Sorrowfully, he died of cancer during the Covid-19 lockdown and his account had to be read to the inquiry.
