The UK’s forced adoption regime and administration of cancer causing drugs has been exposed by a shocking ITV investigation. In the 40 years after WWII it is estimated 200,000 unmarried women gave birth in mother and baby homes run by the church and the state. Here, they were pressured to give their babies up for adoption.
Forced adoption is not the only secret the UK’s mother and baby homes are hiding, with the investigation finding patients were given dangerous drug Diethylstilbestrol. This drug, commonly known as DES, has now been linked to cancer and other serious health conditions.
DES, a synthetic hormone used to dry up breast milk, was widely withdrawn in the 1970s due to its known links to cancer. However, Diane Defries told ITV that in 1974 she was given a mystery injection which dried up her breast milk. She was 16 at the time.
Many nurses across the country have spoken to ITV claiming they administered DES throughout the 70s in hospitals and clinics across the UK.
Inquiries into mother and baby homes in Ireland have been public since 2015, with the lasting horrors exposed in books such as Caelainn Hogan’s Republic of Shame. However, the UK’s part to play has remained under the radar.
Unmarried mothers were treated as second class citizens in the UK. The trauma of this has lasted generations.
Sue Turner was 17 in 1966, when she was sent to a mother and baby home ran by the church of England. Here the was forced to give birth alone, denied the chance to breastfeed and had her daughter forcefully taken away and adopted.
“You never heal, it’s always there. That one decision which was made for me … just ruined my life.” Sue told ITV
For the rest of Sue’s life, a shadow of shame was cast over her. She lived in fear of her second daughter Katie being taken away.
In 2021, the joint committee on human rights concluded that the state bore ultimate responsibility for the lifelong consequences of the forced adoption scandal. The report finding “Between 1949 and 1976, in England and Wales an estimated 185,000 children were taken from unmarried mothers and adopted.“
The UK government is yet to apologise for the atrocities that took place.
