London: The UK government on Tuesday pledged to prioritise mental health as a report into a fatal stabbing rampage by a psychotic patient identified a litany of errors by medical authorities. Nineteen 19-year-old students Grace O'Malley-Kumar and Barnaby Webber and school caretaker Ian Coates died in the attacks in the central English city of Nottingham last June. Health Minister Wes Streeting said it was time to put a greater focus on mental health, amid growing public concern about treatment waiting times and big increases in demand.
"It's time we prioritise mental health so we will be updating the Mental Health Act to bring care into the 21st century to ensure that care is appropriate, proportionate and compassionate -- while keeping the public safe," he wrote in The Sun daily. Victims' relatives said the report revealed "a catalogue of continual failures" lasting years in the handling of paranoid schizophrenic Valdo Calocane who carried out the killings. "It's really hard to actually pinpoint one particular point, because the failings are so systemic and they're so gross," said Emma Webber whose son Barnaby died.
And she warned that what happened in Nottingham was "not a one-off tragedy". "There are more Valdo Calocanes out in our community," she said. According to the report, repeated medical assessments of Calocane underplayed the serious risk he posed to others.
Key details were "minimised or omitted" such as his refusal to take his medication, violent behaviour and pe.