Disabled woman starved to death after benefits withdrawn

[EllieBellend]

I haven't seen this mentioned anywhere but this is truly shocking. Disabled woman let down by all the agencies and basically starved to death after benefits withdrawn. Let down by everyone, the poor poor woman.

www.disabilitynewsservice.com/dwp-hounded-disabled-woman-for-years-before-her-starvation-death-papers-show/

Therein lies the problem. How on earth this poor lady with her mental health history, was deemed fit to work should be questioned. Many of the members of this Society in poor physical, and mental health are having to go to great lengths to access help, or/ and benefits. This lady in particular sounds like she was let down somewhere along the line, by several agencies.

She didn’t starve to death for lack of money if she had some savings. It sounds like it’s the social care support that was lacking.

I don't think her family could help as she wouldn't interact due to psychotic episodes. From the article it appears they tried. Just seems to be lack of communication between the various agencies and unfortunately no one had overall responsibility.

And yes the Conservative Government has made accessing these benefits even more difficult than ever, shame on them, and their supporters.

It's clear she was so frightened by having her income repeatedly stopped that she could not spend money.

It's all in the article. The state created this situation.

When you are disabled you are never "safe". You can be paralysed from the neck down for the last decade, unable to speak from the pain, and you can still be deemed fit to work at any moment. It happens over and over and over. You are never safe from the DWP.

Did she consent for referrals and intervention also? Thats often a problem where the service user wont engage or wont consent.

It’s not that she didn’t want to spend money she had in savings, she was mentally incapable of making financial decisions or budgeting due to her paranoid schizophrenia. You are forgetting she was mostly psychotic and not able to think rationally. She probably had no idea that one sandwich and one cup of coffee a day would slowly starve her to death. Half the time, she would probably even be unaware that her savings account even existed or how to access it. The article clearly states she was unable to shop for food for herself either online or in person.

You see this with many people disabled due to head injuries as well. They act normal, can talk, walk, hold conversations, assure you they are ok, and then they get sent home discharged as rehabilitated. They then forget to eat. They can’t figure out how to shop for food. They then literally starve to death…not even realising they are starving to death.

She was repeatedly judged fit to work, then appealed, then judged disabled. This is what happens with disability benefits. It happens to me every time mine needs renewing. I put aside enough money to cover my healthy needs during the the period between rejection and renewal, and top it up with the backdated payment. Then UC deduct money off me for having savings, which I need to have, to cover that period… and so on.

Its not sensationalising to say people are being failed by a cruel system.

It sounds like she may have had a mental illness, but mental illness is not a disability. It’s an illness which can be treated with therapy and medication. A disability is, by definition, permanent and not treatable. It’s wrong to refer to her as a “disabled woman” - she was not disabled. She had an illness which was judged to be not severe enough to prevent her working. And the article also says that she had money but chose to not spend it and starve because she wanted to buy a house. So she starved herself and died with money in the bank, it had nothing to do with benefits.

Very scared now for my future.

Sounds to me like you don’t know an awful lot about mental illness or disability.

@LadyKenya i agree, my friend had this problem (it was bloody obvious to anyone that even looked at her that she is unable to work) and we are now going through it with a family member who had a traumatic brain injury, he cannot communicate at all ,has had a capacity evaluation and despite sending all the proof , we still get asked if he can email the agencies himself.

You're very ignorant and completely wrong.

Severe mental illness can be defined by the government as a disability.

@Dadaya that's your own personal definition but not one supported by any dictionary or even the DWP. Which is amazing because the DWP is staffed by psychopaths.

In reality disability means [countable] a physical or mental condition that makes it difficult for somebody to do some things that most other people can do.

It’s absolutely bizarre that people are saying it’s her own fault since she had money in the bank. First of all we don’t know how much, second of all are we really arguing that it’s fine because she starved while having money despite being repeatedly turned down for disability benefits? It’s hardly the sign of a rational mind to die because one day they might own a cottage. She needed more help than she got, and that is not her fault.

I am aghast at the posters here saying it’s not really the fault of the DWP. When someone’s illness means that they won’t always manage to comply with instructions then sanctions are not an appropriate response. The old system managed this appropriately. Benefits should be reliable so there is that stability. Failed by the DWP and by her medical team. It’s desperately sad and was avoidable.

It says she wanted to protect her savings to buy a bungalow in Cornwall, and lived on a sandwich a day from a cafe.

Yes, this stuck out to me also. It seems as though she did have money but wanted to save it to buy a house. Also living on a sandwich a day from a cafe - £4 odds - she could've bought 3 cheap meals a day for that. Cheap box of cereal, potatoes, pasta. Or sandwich material if cooking was too expensive.

I'm assuming she had over the savings threshold for benefits (I know some types of benefits are means tested).

Either way, poor lady.

There’s been a couple of high profile cases like this in the media now and it makes me wonder how many have actually been killed in this way by the benefits system and it hasn’t been picked up by the coroner it families and reported on. Could be loads?

Also living on a sandwich a day from a cafe - £4 odds - she could've bought 3 cheap meals a day for that. Cheap box of cereal, potatoes, pasta. Or sandwich material if cooking was too expensive

But the problem is , she was very unwell and this didn't enter her head , she was unable to think rationally.

How on earth this poor lady with her mental health history, was deemed fit to work should be questioned
Mental health issues are often not considered severe enough to be entitled to benefits. Being disabled doesn’t necessarily entitle you to claim anything either - you can be disabled and still be judged fit for work. Even people with developmental disabilities such as autism are often not considered to be eligible for benefits, so it would be odd if someone who doesn’t even have a disability was eligible for benefits when actual autistic people aren’t.

Erol Graham weighed something like 4.5 stone when his body was found

It makes sense. There is no mental health support. It's hideous. Without someone advocating and pushing the mental health services on the behalf of the vulnerable person care fails to materialise. There isn't enough funding for mental health in the UK. It's in such a bad state.

I'm not criticising those who work in mental health services, they are just plugging the holes. There are not enough of them.

It usually the case of pulling funding of those with the least voice, the least pushback. People with mental health issues by the very nature of their problems can't advocate for themselves. Easy target for finding cuts.

Most of the long term homeless have mental health issues. Our society just doesn't want to know.

I have a disability. I am not eligible for benefits. So I’m not surprised that people who don’t even have a disability are not eligible for benefits. The bar for being able to claim benefits is actually set quite high, even an actual disability doesn’t necessarily make you qualify.

I don't know why you're so insistent that she wasn't disabled.

Jeez the ignorance in this post is astounding, and frankly Dadaya you should be embarrassed.

This is what disabled people are up against.