Eating disorders are among the most serious and life-threatening mental illnesses, yet their treatment remains underfunded, misunderstood, and neglected by our healthcare system.
Throughout my six years as the Chair of the Eating Disorders APPG, I have spoken to an extraordinary number of families who have lost a loved one to an eating disorder. But these fatalities are avoidable – eating disorders are treatable.
In recent years, cases have risen at an alarming rate, exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic. The number of children treated for an eating disorder has more than doubled in the last eight years. What was already an overstretched and under-resourced support system for individuals affected by eating disorders has now become a national emergency.
This week, I will lead a Westminster Hall debate to shine a light on the scale of this crisis. The debate comes after the Eating Disorders APPG, with the support of mental health campaigner Hope Virgo, launched a crucial report unveiling widespread failings within eating disorder services across the country. The findings are damning: patients are often denied access to adequate care due to insufficient funding, a lack of training, and a system that simply does not understand the complexities of eating disorders.
Shockingly, we found that thousands of people are being told that they’re either not ‘thin enough’ or that their cases are too ‘complex’ for appropriate treatment, leading to devastating consequences. In some cases, individuals with eating disorders have even been forced into palliative care and labelled as ‘treatment-resistant’. These systemic failures are costing lives.
It’s clear that we need an urgent and comprehensive overhaul of eating disorder services in the UK. That’s why we are calling for urgent investment in services, a complete reformation of eating disorder treatment, and the development of a stand alone eating disorder strategy to tackle this growing crisis.
Lack of investment into eating disorder services has resulted in a situation where patients are being discharged with dangerously low BMIs, in some cases even as low as 13, with no treatment plan in place for their recovery. If we want to encourage people to seek help, we need to give them a guarantee that they will be seen and cared for. Having clear standards can facilitate service improvement, enhance experience for patients and ultimately improve health outcomes.
In the last year alone, more than 30,000 acute admissions for eating disorders were recorded, costing the NHS approximately £220 million. Though of course – the problem goes beyond money. Families are being pushed to breaking point, forced to become primary caregivers without adequate training or support. Parents of adults with eating disorders often have to take on responsibilities that the healthcare system should be managing: monitoring meals, preventing relapses, and advocating for appropriate care. They do this out of love, but the burden is immense and unsustainable.
Funding for eating disorder research is woefully inadequate. Despite eating disorders affecting around 9% of people with mental health conditions in the UK, they received just 1% of the country’s mental health research funding between 2015 and 2019. To develop effective treatments and ensure that everyone with an eating disorder has access to the care they need, this glaring disparity must be addressed.
The government must act by urgently investing in specialist services and developing a clear national strategy that ensures no one is left without support.
As a society, we too need a fundamental shift in how we view and treat eating disorders. They are serious, complex mental health disorders that require medical intervention, compassionate care, and long-term support. Those suffering, and the families supporting them, deserve better. We owe it to them to make eating disorder treatment a national priority, before more lives are lost to a system that isn’t fit for purpose.
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Source: Politics
