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Pursuant to the applicable legislation, in the event of economic deprivation of persons, the
consent to medical treatment is provided by their guardian who is often not present at the
moment when this needs to be administered. Also, it is extremely important to regulate the
role of the person having mental and intellectual disorders in making decisions about medical
measures, that is, in providing consent to such measures. In this respect, the regulations need
to be improved so as to ensure a more effective protection of these persons when applying
medical or scientific tests.
In its visit reports, NPM addressed the recommendations to establish procedures regarding
the physical restraint of social welfare beneficiaries, introducing of Record maintaining to register the injuries of inmates and engage independent authorized physician who would issue
death certificates for patients. The recommendations also addressed the provision of sufficient number of staff to work with the inmates and required number of orthopaedic aids for
them. In order to ensure the privacy of inmates, the recommendations were given to ensure
the preconditions for their privacy. NPM expresses its concerns, as in certain institutions of
social welfare – homes, they identified cases of keeping persons in isolation and some of
them in rooms without elementary conditions, comparable to cages, without tap water or
available toilet facility. Such treatment is the case of abuse and where prolonged, represents a
torture. Also, it was found that in the social welfare institutions – homes, other than isolation,
the measure of mechanical restraint with tying of patients is used, although, unlike psychiatric
institutions, there are no legal grounds for either of such conducts.
The freedom of movement outside the institutions is still being limited to the beneficiaries,
despite the fact that there are no legal grounds for that, nor any procedures in place that
would regulate their keeping inside the institution. NPM referred a recommendation to the
Ministry of Labour, Employment, Veteran and Social Affairs in order to take action from their
own jurisdiction and provide appropriate regulation of such situation.
NPM sent the recommendations in the Reports on visits made to social welfare institutions –
homes, to adopt the Regulation that would set forth the issue of providing items for personal
needs of inmates placed in homes, to develop a Protocol on acting in the event of an unexpected (sudden) death of beneficiaries, including to ensure the sufficient number of medical,
nursing and other staff.
The migrants are now staying in Serbia for a longer time and therefore, the problem of providing the required care to them is by far more complex. Unlike the previous period when
they used to transit through Serbia and stay for only couple of days, they are now staying
for several months. Some of them wish to seek an asylum in Serbia, but most of them still
desire to continue their journey to the developed countries of EU. Bearing in mind that the
migrants will stay in the centres for a prolonged period, by the end of the reporting period,
NPM sent to the Commissariat for Refugees and Migrations the recommendation to introduce
the procedure of complaints against the work of persons engaged in centres. The uncertainty
of continuing the journey, prolonged stay in Serbia, insecure future and not understanding
the situation where they have found themselves cause stress among the migrants, that may
be recognized during the visits and interviews with them. It is therefore important to provide them the psychological support that is not organized in the majority of visited centres.
NPM recommended that the support of professional staff and premises for talking with the
migrants are provided.
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