Peter Fitzpatrick (Louth, Independent) | Oireachtas source

A common threat for children with autism who are transitioning to adolescence is high anxiety levels and obsessive-compulsive disorder, OCD, behaviour. Many of those adolescents are non-verbal. They display their anxiety through OCD, self-injury behaviour, hitting themselves with force, property destruction, poor sleeping patterns and assaulting others. Many of these families live in constant fear of attack from their adolescent child. They live in houses that have been significantly damaged by their adolescent child.

In one situation, an adolescent child flooded the house by pulling the radiators off the wall, and architraves were pulled away from the doors. The same family has no doors on their bathrooms due to destruction. In addition, many of these adolescent children have younger siblings who are in danger of being hurt. This situation cannot continue.

People cannot get a psychiatric consultant in counties Louth and Meath. There must be something seriously wrong. It is not acceptable. These families need help. I ask the Minister of State to come to County Louth to talk with these families. They are in a terrible position at the moment. For me to ask the question on their behalf and get the answer that no-one is available makes no sense whatsoever.

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