Will Bavaria actually treat mentally ill people with depression like criminals in the future? What is the new “Bay-PsychKHG” all about?
We received an inquiry about “Bay-PsychKHG”. The query is as follows and refers to an article in the Süddeutsche:
Hello dear ZDDK team, a friend shared a post that really frightened me. Unfortunately I can't forward the post to you. I don't know it that well. It is a report from the Süddeutsche Zeitung from April 16, 2018. This is about the fact that Bavaria wants to treat allegedly mentally ill people with depression like criminals in the future - and that by means of a police law (?). I am very worried and would like to urgently ask you to check this report for its veracity. Here is the link to the SZ report. Thank you in advance.

The fact check
The Bavarian Mental Health Assistance Act, or Bay-PsychKHG for short , regulates how we deal with mentally ill people. The extremely controversial bill passed by the Bavarian government on April 10, 2018, which the cabinet of Prime Minister Markus Söder (CSU) will shortly issue, is intended to replace the previous Bavarian Accommodation Act (UnterbrG) from 1992 .
A corresponding press release from January 23rd of this year almost sums it up:
“Bavaria is expanding care for people with mental illnesses / Council of Ministers approves new law on assistance for the mentally ill / Social Affairs Minister Emilia Müller: “Important contribution to destigmatizing the mentally ill”
→ To the complete report from the cabinet meeting on January 23, 2018
At first glance, this sounds like a long overdue improvement; with around 60,000 forced placements per year, the Free State holds a sad quota record in the Republic.
“With the law, the Bavarian state government basically wants to expand care for people with mental illnesses and crises. One focus is a crisis service that is available around the clock in order to catch those affected at an early stage. This is intended to significantly reduce inpatient placements, especially so-called compulsory admissions. In addition, nationwide prevention centers should offer outpatient help to mentally ill people who are prone to violence. “ – Source: Berliner Zeitung ©2018
Should the new version of the law actually improve the situation for mentally ill people?
A laudable and certainly urgently needed approach. However, this important topic of 39 paragraphs only accounts for the first four.
The rest is more likely to cause fear and terror - and not only, but especially, among those already affected; the points that “non-consensual admission” and the accompanying bureaucracy are all too real.
Various points were allegedly taken verbatim from the regulations for the penal system, which regulates criminals Whether intentional or not, the impression that the patients are criminals arises from the way they are treated and how they are presented. In any case, the decree lacks any respect for people with mental illnesses and faces an unprecedented barrage from doctors, politicians, journalists and those affected.
“The innovations are based on the existing penal system in which mentally ill offenders are housed.” Gudrun Mahler, consultant for social psychiatry at Diakonie Bayern, criticizes this sharply; This would give the impression that mentally ill people are being equated with criminals. Source: FAZ
In the last section of this article there is a partial counter-statement from the “Bayernkurier” to rumors on the subject .
The Süddeutsche Zeitung summarizes the bile-bitter aftertaste of this thinly sugared pill in a comment as follows:
“The only positive achievement in the new law is the establishment of a comprehensive psychiatric crisis service. Almost all other regulations are based on criminal law and the penal system for criminals.” (1)
Immediately with Article 5, the draft strikes a completely different tone:
“Art. 5 Requirements for Accommodation”
(1) Anyone who significantly endangers the general welfare or themselves due to a mental disorder, in particular illness, the legal interests of others, can be accommodated against or without their will
Source: Bavaria State Parliament
(Article 5, Accommodation requirements)
Regarding paragraph 1
Article 5 paragraph 1 basically continues the previous legal situation according to Article 1 paragraph 1 sentences 1 and 2 UnterbrG. However, the regulation will be made clearer, aligned with modern classification systems for mental disorders and the term public safety and order will be replaced by the terms “legal interests of others, the general good or oneself” for reasons of destigmatization. Public accommodation serves to avert danger. Accommodation under public law comes into consideration if the person concerned violates the legal interests of others or the general welfare (endangerment of others) or themselves (endangerment of self; cf. on the legislative competence of the state legislature under the aspect of the “idea of care” according to Art. 74 No. 7 GG BVerfG, decision of October 7, 1981 - 2 BvR 1194/80, NJW 1982, 691). In these cases, the person concerned may be accommodated against or without their will.
In the case of danger to others, there must be a significant risk to the legal interests of others or to the general welfare. In practice, the focus will often be on protecting the important legal interests listed in Article 11 Paragraph 3 Sentence 2 of the Police Tasks Act.
These are:
1. the existence or security of the federal government or a state,
2. life, health or freedom,
3. sexual self-determination,
4. significant property positions or
5. things whose preservation is in the special public interest.
An attack on parked police vehicles can pose a threat to the public, for example.
Source: Bavaria State Parliament , p.31(For comparison, its predecessor, the Bavarian Accommodation Act (UnterbrG) from 1992. )
massive data set, the so-called “accommodation file,” should be created immediately for each individual admission . The surname, first name, other names, date and place of birth, gender, marital status, nationality, information on a special need for security, day of admission, start and end of an escape or misconduct as part of the stress test should be recorded, if this results in a search , day and reason for dismissal.
Source: Bavarian State Parliament , Article 33, accommodation file
“And it's not just chronically ill people who are on thin ice: under the new law, every person who was admitted even for a short time would be documented by the police and their diagnosis could be viewed by the authorities. Dementia sufferers, drug addicts, people with severe depressive episodes or people who were briefly drunk would be affected.” (3)
Unusually, everyone - with the exception of the CSU - agrees that brutal measures should be pushed through in a way that ruthlessly ignores real needs, and that the legislature seems to have lost sight of all measures.
Disgust and outrage online everywhere, doctors worry about decades of progress in therapy and denounce the treatment of patients who have subtly mutated from victims to delinquents and are treated like criminals. The catalog of harassment reads like the prison rules of a maximum security wing - one cannot imagine the feelings of the patients.
Rules like in prison (2)
“And the law provides for further restrictions on freedom for those affected: If people are actually accommodated in the clinic, then it would be possible that in the future they would only be allowed to own magazines or sound recordings if they consent to an inspection. In addition, the planned law allows visits to be restricted or only to take place under video surveillance.” (2)
“ Fact Check ” takes the following position on the topic of surveillance (excerpt)
“Visitations are only monitored if this for reasons of safety or to protect the person being accommodated .”
It can be said that the statement leaves open a fairly broad spectrum of possibilities and therefore leaves room for speculation as it does not go into the detailed circumstances. Everyone can form their own impression of this.
“Such regulations remind the Bavarian data protection officer Thomas Petri of the laws for the penal system or correctional facilities - i.e. places where people are housed, some of whom have committed serious crimes. The many parallels to these existing laws could give the impression “that people housed under public law are to be confused with criminals (…),” writes Petri in a statement. “The goal of destigmatizing the mentally ill is thwarted.” ( 2 )
“The application for accommodation is usually recorded by the police by relatives. If a patient is discharged from the clinic – on the mend or even recovered – then he or she must report this to the responsible police station. In the future, this would also apply if the person did not threaten others, but only posed a danger to themselves.
The state government's plans go even further. They stipulate that the data of mentally ill people be passed on to a central office and stored in an accommodation file for at least five years. This includes, for example, the diagnosis that was made to the patient at the time, the findings and the therapy that was initiated. Other authorities, including administration, security and justice, should have access to this file. The human resources departments of authorities should not be able to access it, the responsible State Ministry for Family, Labor and Social Affairs said upon request.” ( 2 )
(*Editor's note: will probably be omitted, but is still controversial.)
Those affected primarily express fear and uncertainty; many are already thinking about stopping the therapy; are afraid of being caught in the net that was supposed to protect them from falling, of being “attracted to attention”, of being locked away and “on record” and ultimately of being convicted. And so we get deeper and deeper into a swamp of fear and depression.
On Tuesday, Söder announced that the state government was still “open to changes”. Is it [called. Behind the scenes, some of these changes have taken shape.
For example, when it comes to the controversial accommodation file that is to be re-established. This file, which is accessible to several authorities, will no longer contain the doctors' examination findings - which was also met with massive criticism from the Bavarian data protection officer. The planned institution of accommodation advisory boards will also be abandoned; instead, the aim is to strengthen the existing visiting commissions, as the districts had requested.”
The “Bayernkurier”, on the other hand, fully supports the draft law and has provided its own “fact check” that is intended to expose fake reports circulating on the Internet. This can be found at Bayern Kurier .
Result:
To the best of our knowledge and belief, we have ensured that no untruths have found their way into this article. We also refer a report that the patients had to wear “institution clothes” to the land of fake news.
Some formulations are so vague that, in our opinion, they do not demonstrably take the claim “false” into account. The counter-notice can be accessed at the link above; The details of the draft as well as a possible collapse in the case of the so-called “accommodation file” are currently being discussed. The deletion of the diagnosis and a shortening of the storage period are under discussion.
Further sources:
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Notes:
1) This content reflects the current state of affairs at the time of publication. The reproduction of individual images, screenshots, embeds or video sequences serves to discuss the topic. 2) Individual contributions were created through the use of machine assistance and were carefully checked by the Mimikama editorial team before publication. ( Reason )

