into force globally in 2006. Australia is in the unusual position of having signed the treaty in 2009 – an indication of support for the purposes of the treaty – but not ratified it, which would make the country legally bound to adhere to it.

The Opcat requires countries to set up an independent and sufficiently-resourced monitoring body that has unrestricted access to all places of detention, including prisons, police lock-ups, juvenile detention centres, immigration detention facilities, locked psychiatric facilities, and secure disability and aged care facilities.

In a joint statement issued on Friday, the 18 peak health bodies – including the Australasian College of Emergency Medicine, the Australian College of Mental Health Nurses, the Public Health Association of Australia, the Australian Psychological Society, and Children’s Healthcare Australasia – said2009, and so is obliged to ensure that no torture, inhumane or degrading treatment takes place in detention centres under its control. Bodies such as the Commonwealth ombudsman, the Australian Human Rights Commission, the Australian Red Cross and the UNHCR are able to scrutinise Australian detention facilities.

Doctors have spoken out previously about the abuse of people in detention: more than 40 signed an open letter in June condemning the Border Force Act that imposed a two-year prison sentence on whistleblowers who spoke out about conditions in detention, and last weekend, staff at the Royal Children’s Hospital in Melbourne protested at detention conditions, arguing they were inherently harmful.

Earlier in the year, doctors at the hospital refused to discharge a patient and her daughter in order to prevent them being