Sir, – Your editorial ("Consent needed on treatment", March 9th) endorses a new proposal to change the Mental Health Act so as to only permit electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) to be administered to a patient who has given "consent". In so doing, you in effect are supporting a proposal that would allow a very psychotic and irrational or suicidal individual to refuse to receive ECT treatment, one which you also describe as a "proven and relatively safe treatment that can be life-saving in people who are actively suicidal".
If “consent” is to be the overriding deciding factor, then presumably you also will agree that consent from psychotic and irrational people should be obtained before their carers actively intervene to try to prevent them from committing suicide? – Yours, etc,
IVOR SHORTS,
Rathfarnham,
Dublin 16.