Home educated boy dies

[star1]

https://www.theguardian.com/society...-scurvy-a-year-before-his-death-leaked-report

I'm absolutely shocked that there doesn't seem to be any current procedures for making sure every child is regularly visited for safe guarding. Apparently this little boy hadn't been seen by anyone outside of the family from the age of 1 until he died at 8. How can we be losing children in the system like that? I dread to think what could be happening to some of these

In fact, my children have only been seen by health visitor at about 9 months then nothing until 2.5 year check (apart from 2 vaccines at about a year old). That's way too long in my opinion for children that don't attend nursery or see anyone else who could pick up safeguarding issues. I would want every child to be seen at least every 3 months. What do you think? X

 

[Larkspur]

I'm in NZ, and neither of my children attend nursery (we have a nanny) so outside of vaccinations, dental and Plunket checkups, they aren't regularly seen by any external agencies.

But with one dental checkup a year, one set of vaccinations (on average) and one Plunket (HV) check, that's once every four months on average.

I have never missed appointments so don't know what the follow-up is like if you do. But I know from friends who have worked in pediatric departments in hospitals that the number of parents who are extremely slack about their kids' health is shocking. One was telling me that they have to chase some parents up to 10 times to get them to bring their kids who have severe health problems (like cancer or rheumatic fever or diabetes) in for their regular appointments. That's 10 times EVERY appointment. It's a huge job staying on top of checkups for even the most severely ill children, so I can't imagine the kind of resources that would be needed to ensure every child was seen by an agency every three months.

 

[Natsku]

Poor boy There should be some way of ensuring all children are seen by someone outside of the family at least once a year. We have yearly check ups at the child health clinic here (and they do part of the check up without the parent(s) present which could be life-saving in cases of abuse as it gives the child the opportunity to tell) and I reckon they'd follow up if a child kept missing them, have a social worker make contact with the family or something like that. At least I hope they would.

 

[sophxx]

It's very very sad but nothing to do with home ed. alot of people never take there children to the doctors or engage in services children also die from neglect or untreated health problems who attend school.

 

[Natsku]

It's very very sad but nothing to do with home ed. alot of people never take there children to the doctors or engage in services children also die from neglect or untreated health problems who attend school.

But when the children attend school there are opportunities for teachers/other staff to notice something is up and get social workers involved. When the children aren't attending any school and also aren't going to check ups etc. there's very little opportunity for someone to see that something is wrong.

 

[sophxx]

It's very very sad but nothing to do with home ed. alot of people never take there children to the doctors or engage in services children also die from neglect or untreated health problems who attend school.

But when the children attend school there are opportunities for teachers/other staff to notice something is up and get social workers involved. When the children aren't attending any school and also aren't going to check ups etc. there's very little opportunity for someone to see that something is wrong.

but most children in schools who are abused or under nurished dont get picked up on or there families get the surpport they need. if you going to mistreat your child you will do it weather they are in school or not. we have home ed nurses in the uk the same as school nurses olus home ed teams in each council if you choose to not engage with these people there is nothing anyone can do as our services dont have the money to remove all the children that need to be put in care. the local councils cant even handle the amiint of children misssing from education whio are still registered in school. it has nothing to do with home education that his parents were not responisble parents. 99.9 per cent of home educaters are responisble parents you always get the odd parents same as you do at school. there has been many children who have died through neglect who have been in school setting or missing from education that have not been prevented by the child going to school there was a case last year. the teachers did nothing about that.
this family had been reported to social services by the mums ex work collegues at school and a lawyer but social services didnt do anything after being refused entry to the home.

 

[Natsku]

It's very very sad but nothing to do with home ed. alot of people never take there children to the doctors or engage in services children also die from neglect or untreated health problems who attend school.

But when the children attend school there are opportunities for teachers/other staff to notice something is up and get social workers involved. When the children aren't attending any school and also aren't going to check ups etc. there's very little opportunity for someone to see that something is wrong.

but most children in schools who are abused or under nurished dont get picked up on or there families get the surpport they need. if you going to mistreat your child you will do it weather they are in school or not. we have home ed nurses in the uk the same as school nurses olus home ed teams in each council if you choose to not engage with these people there is nothing anyone can do as our services dont have the money to remove all the children that need to be put in care. the local councils cant even handle the amiint of children misssing from education whio are still registered in school. it has nothing to do with home education that his parents were not responisble parents. 99.9 per cent of home educaters are responisble parents you always get the odd parents same as you do at school. there has been many children who have died through neglect who have been in school setting or missing from education that have not been prevented by the child going to school there was a case last year. the teachers did nothing about that.
this family had been reported to social services by the mums ex work collegues at school and a lawyer but social services didnt do anything after being refused entry to the home.

Social services obviously failed here but you can't deny that having a child seen by an outside authority regularly (i.e. school) adds an extra layer of protection. If that boy had been going to school social services would have been able to see him and see there was enough cause for concern to intervene. But because they couldn't see him as his parents hid him away they couldn't see the condition he was in. I really don't think you'd get a school-attending child dying of scury.

 

[catty]

I agree with you Natsku I remember when I was about 6 or 7 I fell off the fridge and cracked my head off the freezer. It was a fairly bad fall but my mum never took me to hospital (she probably should have) but she didn't drive and didn't feel it required an ambulance so she wasn't sure what to do. Anyway when I went to school with 2 black eyes and a large egg head I was questioned separately by 3 different teachers in the school. My mum was mortified but they really do check that my story was adding up etc. I imagine if tou are home schooled and also don't attend appointments then who would really know.