IRELAND
Irish Independent
Colette Browne
The establishment of a Commission of Investigation into the mother-and-baby home scandal is welcome, but the church is not the only body with questions to answer.
For the past number of weeks there have been ubiquitous expressions of shock, surprise and revulsion from church leaders, politicians and the public at the horrifying stories emanating from mother-and-baby homes.
Tales of ostracised women incarcerated for years, newborn babies being torn from their hands and children being raised in Dickensian, disease-ridden conditions leading to mortality rates that were five times higher than the national average.
But these institutions did not operate in a vacuum and the depredations suffered by women and children, locked up behind their walls, have been a matter of public record for many decades.
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