UK: Medical reports condemn "chemical straightjacket"
01 September 1998
A report in the journal, Medical Health Care, based on a questionnaire survey of 108 National Health Service trusts, severely criticised police misuse of CS spray in August. The investigation, by a team from the Maudsley Hospital, revealed that a third of NHS hospitals said that they had treated psychiatric patients brought in by the police after the spray was used. Researchers said that they were "appalled" to learn of a dozen incidents where the spray had been used to quell disruptive patients and said the spray was: "...totally at odds with the therapeutic role of health care professionals, and inappropriate within a health care setting." A spokesman for the hospital added:
"The inappropriate use of CS gas poses a serious health risk to the mentally ill and nursing staff. There should be an urgent review of its use. The police are using it to subdue people before bringing them into hospital." (p404)
In a separate development, Cliff Prior, of the National Schizophrenia Fellowship, has warned that: "CS can exacerbate the cardiac side-effects of some treatments for schizophrenia. The full interaction with psychiatric drugs is unknown but potentially very dangerous." Additionally, doctors at the National Poisons Service have claimed that there are adverse effects from police use of the spray. They noted that blistering side effects developed about three days after exposure to the chemicals in some cases.
The research suggests that police forces are making routine use of the spray, an argument endorsed by Peter Moorhouse, chairman of the Police Complaints Authority, who, in an interview with the Independent on Sunday, noted that it had been used more than 10,000 times by police since it introduction last October; during the past year police have received more than 250 official complaints about its use. Moorhouse said of police use of the spray:
"there's a tendency for it to be used to ensure an easy arrest, and that's worrying. You can see the temptation - if I'm a middle-aged officer who is a bit worried about his abilities to handle a situation, the temptation is to pull out the CS spray and use it at an early stage so that I don't have any trouble."
Moorhouse's concerns have been amply demonstrated in previous issues of Statewatch, and a number of recent cases highlight the problem. In August a 4-year old girl inhaled the gas when police tried to arrest to men nearby to where she was playing; her mother intends to sue West Midlands police. An official complaint has been lodged with Kent police after a 43-year old woman was sprayed in her police cell after she let off her rape alarm in it. Another complaint has been lodged with South Wales police after a man was incapacitated as he attempted to break into his own house. In September the Police Complaints Authority announced an investigation after a 76-year old man collapsed after five officers used the spray in an attempt to help bailiffs evict him from his home.
The use of CS spray has become so commonplace that it has replaced the truncheon as the weapon of restraint among police officers. The excessive use of the spray, and the abundant complaints that accompany it, have prompted the Department of Health to refer it to an independent committee on toxicity and mutagenicity who will provide a scientific "review of the evidence available on the safety of CS."
Mental Health Care Vol. 11, no 12 (August) 1998; Independent 2.8.98, 23.8.98.; Times 7.9.98, 14.9.98; Home Office press release 24.9.98.