At least 9,000 children died in the homes of mothers and babies in Ireland between 1922 and 1998, where single mothers and their illegitimate children were forced to live in “dire” conditions that included testing for forced vaccines, starvation and burials in the yard, a survey found. blunt news released on Tuesday.
The Mother and Baby Homes Investigation Commission, launched in 2015 by the Irish Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth, concluded that homes were effectively a death sentence for babies and torture for their mothers.
In a few years, homes recorded infant mortality rates almost double the country’s average and found that homes before 1960 “did not save the lives of ‘illegitimate’ children” and “in fact, they seem[ed] to have significantly reduced their prospects for survival. ”
In total, 15% of the 57,000 children who called the 18 institutions under investigation home during the 76-year period died – a number that the Commission’s report called “probably the most disturbing feature of these institutions”.
At the same time, the increasing deaths and decrepit conditions were known to local authorities, who did nothing about it, the report concluded.
The Commission painted a clear picture of what it was like to be a single mother and fatherless child in Ireland for much of the 20th century. Expelled from their homes by their families and ridiculed by their communities, women who became pregnant outside of marriage were forced to go to institutions simply because there was nowhere else to go.
Considered a haven, the houses were little more than walls where mothers had to crouch on the floor for dinner and lived in “cold and seemingly indifferent” environments, full of “emotional abuse”, “defamation” and “derogatory comments.”
Many of the houses were overcrowded, understaffed and with inadequate water and sanitation services – forcing many of the women to use the outdoor toilet. Serious outbreaks of typhoid and diphtheria have plagued the homes and killed many of the mothers and their children, the Commission concluded.
For meals, houses run by the local government often served “spoiled meat and low-quality bread and milk with little nutritional value” and, in general, were often considered “adulterated or unfit for consumption”.
In one house, bread and tea were the only meals served, but it was still “too generous” for needy families, said a local government official at the time, forcing the house to reduce its four daily meals to three.
In all homes, the Commission found a total of seven vaccine tests that took place between 1934 and 1973 and identified several children who were involved.
“It is clear that there was no compliance with the relevant ethical and regulatory standards of the time, since the consent was not obtained from the mothers of the children or their guardians and the necessary licenses were not in force,” said the Commission.
Burial records for many of the houses were also not kept or were incomplete and in at least one house, dead children were buried on the institution’s grounds.
The BBC reported that the Irish government must apologize for the horrible conditions and the severe infant mortality rates. Prime Minister Mícheál Martin said the report revealed a “dark, difficult and shameful chapter” in Irish history, the vehicle said.
“As a nation, we must face the whole truth of our past,” said the policeman.