A BBC report - 'I had anti-government views so they treated me for schizophrenia':
When Zhang Junjie was 17 he decided to protest outside his university about rules made by China's government. Within days he had been admitted to a psychiatric hospital and treated for schizophrenia.
Junjie is one of dozens of people identified by the BBC who were hospitalised after protesting or complaining to the authorities.
Many people we spoke to were given anti-psychotic drugs, and in some cases electroconvulsive therapy (ECT), without their consent.
While there have been reports for decades that hospitalisation is used in China as a way of detaining dissenting citizens without involving the courts, a leading Chinese lawyer has told the BBC that the issue - which legislation sought to resolve - has recently seen a resurgence.
Junjie says he was restrained and beaten by hospital staff before being forced to take medication....
"The doctors told me I had a very serious mental disease… Then they tied me to a bed. The nurses and doctors repeatedly told me, because of my views on the party and the government, then I must be mentally ill. It was terrifying," he told the BBC World Service. He was there for 12 days.
He's not the only one, of course.
An activist called Jie Lijian told us he had been treated for mental illness without his consent in 2018.
Lijian says he was arrested for attending a protest demanding better pay at a factory. He says police interrogated him for three days before taking him to a psychiatric hospital.
Like Junjie, Lijian says he was prescribed anti-psychotic drugs that impaired his critical thinking.
After a week in the hospital, he says he refused any more medication. After fighting with staff, and being told he was causing trouble, Lijian was sent for ECT - a therapy which involves passing electric currents through a patient's brain.
"The pain was from head to toe. My whole body felt like it wasn't my own. It was really painful. Electric shock on. Then off. Electric shock on. Then off. I fainted several times. I felt like I was dying," he says.
He says he was discharged after 52 days. He now has a part-time job in Los Angeles and is seeking asylum in the US.
Comments