SO A mental health trust is bringing in a blanket ban on smoking (The Argus, March 6).

My experiences of being involved in getting very unwell people admitted into mental hospitals tell me that this policy, in many cases, is doomed to fail.

When any of my hostel residents demonstrated clear signs that their mental health was declining the first step we took was to call in a Community Psychiatric Nurse (CPN).

If he/she felt that the best course of action would be an in-patient stay he would do everything he could to get my resident to agree to a voluntary hospital admission.

This was so much better than him having to call upon a GP and a psychiatrist in order for the three of them to be able to get the patient sectioned and thus compel him to go into hospital without his consent.

This was the very last option that anyone wanted.

After all, removing someone’s liberty in this way is virtually akin to locking him up without a trial.

I seem to remember that, in most cases, the resident did agree to a voluntary admission and the medical experts did not have to go down the sectioning route.

However, the seeds of my misgivings over this smoking ban are contained in the body of The Argus report.

It said that people with mental health problems are likely to smoke more heavily than others, and that two out of every five cigarettes are smoked by someone with a mental health condition.

That being the case I can see people, who know about the ban, refusing to accept a voluntary admission and, in the case of those who only find out about it when they arrive at the hospital, walking straight back out again.

The end result will be that people suffering mental health episodes will not receive the treatment they need, because the criteria for sectioning is so strict that a voluntary admission is often the only way that they can be helped to get better.

Yet another plan that looks good on paper but, in my view, will not work out in practice.

Eric Waters, Ingleside Crescent, Lancing