Law reform is needed in many areas, most particularly in the Mental Health Ordinance (Cap 136), which takes in one's capacity or incapacity to plead in court as to whether a hospitalization order should be issued.
Currently, the forensic psychiatric department at Castle Peak Hospital is the sole provider of full-range specialized psychiatric services here.
In 1972, Siu Lam Psychiatric Centre became operational under the Correctional Services Department. It receives offenders with mental disorders sentenced for compulsory inpatient treatment (via hospitalization orders) and remands prisoners suspected to have psychiatric problems or requiring assessment and treatment referred by other correctional institutions.
Meanwhile, Pamela Youde Nethersole Eastern Hospital's psychiatric department was set up to provide psychiatric services to high-risk discharged patients.
Mental health is a huge subject, so I will confine my discussion to the compulsory regime provided under the law in Hong Kong, which is either in the interests of the patient or for the protection of others.
The powers are draconian, so it is important to provide safeguards and a balanced approach.
The compulsory regime includes both short- and long-term detention and treatment.
Readers can look up sections 31, 32 and 36 of the ordinance, which deal with compulsory admission for observation for seven days, extended observation for 21 days and indefinite treatment, respectively.
Before a patient can be detained, doctors must fill out a form recommending detention and either a magistrate or a district court judge must countersign the form.
Once patients are admitted, they are placed in locked wards and have their belongings locked away, including their phones. The individual cannot leave the ward without permission.
Under Section 36, patients can be detained indefinitely based on the opinion of just two doctors.
Hong Kong inherited this compulsory regime from an earlier version of mental health legislation in the UK and has not kept up to date with the changes made in the UK, where instead of a judge, an approved mental health professional generally initiates the application, which must then be supported by two medical recommendations.
Such approved mental health professionals can be from various professions but they cannot be doctors.
I was called upon to write this article by a much-traumatized person, who I shall call "John."
He complained about noise emanating from the floor above his flat to his management office - apparently in an aggressive manner because he was frustrated with their lack of effort, at which point the police were called in and he was taken away in an ambulance to Tuen Mun Hospital.
After being questioned by a nurse, he was then taken away to Castle Peak Hospital for examination by a doctor, who decided to detain him. His application was countersigned by a magistrate and he had his belongings and phone taken away.
He was detained for 21 days and was only released after they used his mobile phone to call his family members abroad.
During the time he was detained, he was treated with medication that made him sleepy. They finally released him after he told them he will sell his flat to get rid of the noise.
Even today, he feels upset by his treatment as he was declared normal by a doctor from Alliance Medical Centre.
Therefore, I am of the view that we should update our law in line with the UK position.
Susan Liang is a lawyer who likes to speak her mind on issues that concern the man on the street
