Police officers on the Pablo Ruiz Picasso promenade in Malaga. Carlos Diaz Martin (EFE)
Adrián (not his real name) is a five-year-old boy from Malaga who, according to his mother, has had numerous health problems in the last two years.
Constant vomiting, stomach problems, dizziness, blood in the stool, fever and even aggressive behavior that required anxiolytics.
Between 2020 and 2021, the parent has taken him up to 130 times to his primary pediatrician, but also to hospital emergencies or private centers such as Vithas, Hospiten and Quirón.
A police investigation has revealed that in the vast majority of cases the visits were unnecessary, the symptoms exaggerated or invented and that the little boy, with mild autism, received disproportionate medication.
The 38-year-old mother has been arrested by the National Police for an alleged crime of child abuse due to injuries.
The mother suffers from what psychology defines as Munchausen syndrome by proxy, a type of child abuse in which her caregiver fakes symptoms or causes real ones to make it appear that the child is sick.
Unnecessary medical care, moreover, is potentially harmful to the victim.” Those who suffer from Munchausen need to feel like ultracarers, superheroes.
They get satisfaction from feeling that they take good care of another person, like this boy, but in return they have him subjugated”, explains Charo Rueda, Professor of Psychology and Professor of Cognitive Neuroscience in the Department of Experimental Psychology at the University of Granada.
The specialist points out that the consequences of this behavior in children are important, because they affect physical health and also socio-emotional development.
Sometimes,
minors can even collaborate in the exaggeration and lies about their supposed illnesses.
“Your reference adult is making you see that the world is like that.
How is he going to contradict his mother when he is so small?" She points out, insisting that the situation "is absolutely harmful for any little one."
It was Adrián's pediatrician who gave, in April 2021, the first voice of alarm.
After one of her multiple attentions, he communicated his fears to the Junta de Andalucía by completing a SIMIA sheet.
This is a procedure of the Andalusian Administration to notify "cases in which the existence of situations of risk or helplessness is known or suspected" of a minor, something that happened 9,346 times during 2021, of which 539 come from the health field , according to data from the Ministry of Equality, Social Policies and Conciliation.
Sources in this area explain that after the health professional's notice, they requested reports from the social services of the Malaga City Council, "who opted to carry out an intervention with the family."
The child's situation, however, did not change.
The father ended up denouncing the situation at the police station on February 14.
Everything sped up.
The members of the Group of Minors (Grume) of Malaga then began what they call a "very delicate" job.
"It is difficult to investigate a mother for taking very good care of her child," explains one of the agents involved.
“But when you scratch, you realize that this care is sick and that the life of the little one can be in danger.
It was a work against the clock due to the risk that the minor was running, ”says the police officer.
The first evidence collected came from public health.
The number of accumulated medical visits in the last two years was very high, sometimes with unbelievable pictures.
The data was crossed with that of private centers such as Quiron, Vithas and Hospiten.
In total, there were 73 medical visits in 2020 and 57 in 2021. “There were even two times on the same day.
In these consultations, he asked to increase the dose of anxiolytics such as Trankimazin to calm Adrián's alleged aggressiveness.
Excessive medication is the supposed cause of the child not being able to stand, hence the woman moved him in a wheelchair.
According to the police, the woman managed, on occasions, to manipulate the toilets to convince them of what, from her point of view, was happening.
They believe that this is why the boy has determined a level three of autism, more serious, when they consider that his is a mild case.
Other times he was unsuccessful, such as when they questioned his broken wrist due to his son's alleged aggressiveness.
They also refused to insert a gastric tube because the boy was gaining weight and height normally.
Among the reports collected by the police is that of the minor's school, where they assure that he behaves well and is affectionate, without observing aggressive or self-injurious behavior.
In fact, these and all the other symptoms disappeared when Adrián spent a few days away from his mother.
"There we already confirmed that he was the cause of everything," say sources of the investigation, which accelerated at the end of March.
Then, the child was admitted to the Maternal and Child Hospital with a supposed picture of vomiting and fever.
Upon verifying his history and the absence of illness, the health workers issued a second SIMIA sheet, which finally led the Andalusian Government's Child Protection Service to withdraw custody of the mother.
Since he is with his foster family, Adrián does not present any of the symptoms for which his mother constantly took him to the doctor, except for mild autism.
“He is very affectionate, laughs, eats without problems, plays, runs and jumps like any child,” sources from the investigation say, where they point out that the next step will be, if the reports reflect this, to leave the little one in the care of his father .
