Skip to main content
Home

Main navigation

  • Top stories
  • Health
  • Crime
  • Politics
  • Business
  • Tech
  • Culture
  • Sports
  • Weird
  • 1-1-2
Image
1280px-VariousPills
Pills (Photo: MorgueFile / Wikimedia Commons) - Credit: Pills (Photo: MorgueFile / Wikimedia Commons)
Health
children's home
Maria Regina
tranquilizers
sedative
antidepressants
Youth Care
Stevensbeek
Noord-Brabant
De Winter committee
Micha de Winter
Els Dijks
Sylvia Brochard
RObert Vermeiren
Friday, 22 June 2018 - 09:33
Share this:
  • facebook
  • twitter
  • linkedin
  • whatsapp
  • reddit

Kids in Dutch children's homes forced to take sedatives for years: report

Children in Dutch children's homes were forced for years to take sedatives and antidepressants in the 1970s, RTL Nieuws reports based on its own research.

Among other things, the broadcaster spoke to five former residents of girls' boarding house Maria Regina in Stevensbeek, Noord-Brabant. In the 70s they were given drugs like Valium and Seresta. According to the De Winter Committee, which is investigating violence in youth care, this was also common practice in other children's homes.

Maria Regina was a shelter for girls with behavioral and education problems, often from broken families, according to the broadcaster. They were placed there by the government, sometimes after a court removed them from their parents' custody.

A former employee of Maria Regina confirmed to RTL Nieuws that children were often given heavy tranquilizers, a practice that only stopped at the end of the 70s. The children in the boarding house also had to work in the launderette as therapy and did not go to school because they were exempted from compulsory education.

Els Dijks lived at Maria Regina between the ages of 13 and 16 years. "When we woke up, there were pills on the plate. We went to eat, then we went to the launderette, but then I was half-asleep folding sheets. It made me really tired. In my eyes they were just sleeping pills", she said to the broadcaster.

Sylvia Brochard also spent three years in the boarding house in the 70s. "I do not know what I got them for or who prescribed them, but you just got them and were obliged to take them. If you were in the isolation cell, you got extra medicines to keep you calm."

The other former residents RTL Nieuws talked to tell the same stories. They called their time in Maria Regina "hell" and a "terrible period".

According to the De Winter Committee, Maria Regina was not the only children's home to sedate their residents. "I can not name numbers", Committee chairman Micha de Winter said to RTL. "We're also investigating that, but the stories you mention from that particular institution are in any case not the only ones."

The former residents of Maria Regina are angry about how they were treated. They want apologies from the government and want to know more about the time they spent in Maria Regina. "I want to read my report", Sylvia Borchard said to the broadcaster. "And Indeed: why the pills? Why did we have to work? Why did we not have to go to school? I want answers to that."

Children's psychiatrists are shocked about the forced medication given to young children, RTL Nieuws writes. The fact that it happened in the 70s, when medication was thought about differently, is no excuse. "What I see here is a step further", Robert Vermeiren, a professor of child- and youth psychiatry, said to the broadcaster. "At that time, it was also not the intention to make people dull, to drug them and at the same time force them to work. That can simply not be. That is not a good medical practice."

Follow us:

Latest stories

  • Cyber threat increasing faster than Dutch companies' resilience
  • Fourth person arrested in Peter R. de Vries murder Monday afternoon
  • Over 350 monkeypox cases diagnosed in the Netherlands so far; First child tests positive
  • Fed-up Schiphol passengers march up baggage claim belt to grab luggage
  • Rising Covid infections prompt nursing homes to ask visitors to use face masks
  • Free market home rental prices jump 12 percent in a year

Top stories

  • Over 350 monkeypox cases diagnosed in the Netherlands so far; First child tests positive
  • Police arrest new suspect for directing murder of journalist Peter R. de Vries
  • Over 1.6 million people experienced discrimination last year
  • NS running fewer trains this week due to staff shortages
  • Tractors on highways, blocking distribution centers in another day of farmers protests
  • House fire in Waalwijk apartment sends 3 to hospital

© 2012-2022, NL Times, All rights reserved.

Footer menu

  • Privacy
  • Contact
  • Partner content