☞ The NMPT has been underlying for years that accommodation in corridors obviously limits the inmates’ right to privacy. The same applies to too big a number of
inmates in hospital bedrooms. It negatively impacts treatment while generating
tensions among patients. In case of patients who are subject to a security measure,
hospitalization in such conditions may take many years 116.
CPT
The establishment of a positive therapeutic environment includes in the first place
ensuring appropriate living space to patients (…). Special attention must be paid to decoration of patients’ rooms dedicated for rest, in order to provide visual stimulation to
them. It is highly recommended to equip the rooms in tables and night tables next to the
beds; moreover, patients should be allowed to keep certain personal belongings (pictures, books, etc.). One must also underline the importance of ensuring certain place to
patients in which they can keep their belongings locked; a lack of such a solution may
undermine patient’s feeling of security and autonomy.117.
Video Surveillance in psychiatric hospitals
Video surveillance of other rooms than isolation rooms has not yet been regulated statutorily in
Poland.118. Despite the Minister of Health’s announcements119 of intention to introduce appropriate
regulations to the Mental Health Protection Act, this question remains unresolved.
☞For video surveillance of patients’ safety in hospitals to be legal, the justification
to apply it must be provided statutorily.
Absence of regulations concerning convoys of inmates subject to security measure
Statutory definition of who, in what cases, using what direct coercion measures and by what type
of vehicles may convoy detainees who stay in hospitals instead of prisons is a minimum as far as safety
of such detainees is concerned. The issue remains unresolved120.
116
117
118
119
120
52
See a Report of the Commissioner for Human Rights on the operation in Poland of the National Mechanism for
the Torture Prevention in 2017.
See CPT Standards, CPT /Inf/E (2002) 1 – Rev. 2011.
See Article 18e (2) of the Mental Health Protection Act of 19 August 1994 (Journal of Laws (Dz. U.) of 2018,
item 1878, consolidated version).
General Intervention of CHR to the Minister of Health of 5 October 2018, KMP.574.8.2015.
The issue has been described since 2013 in Commissioner of Human Rights‘ Reports on the operation of the
National Mechanism for the Prevention of Tortures.
PART IV – Situation in places of detention
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