Joint statement from Westbank Orphanage Survivors Group and Bethany Home Survivors Group
State must admit fault in relation to Bethany Home and Westbank Orphanage
As a former residents of Westbank Orphanage Greystones Co Wicklow and Bethany Home Dublin we welcome the children's rights referendum in the Republic of Ireland. We hope its successful enactment will prevent in future the type of abuse we suffered.

Last year unmarked graves of 219 Bethany children who died between 1922-49, were discovered in Mount Jerome Cemetery, Dublin 8, by Bethany researcher Niall Meehan, (Journalism & Media Faculty of Griffith College Dublin). The vast majority of deaths occurred after the state was supposed to be inspecting the home under the 1934 Maternity Act, designed to put a stop to high mortality in unwed mother's homes. Nearly two thirds of the deaths (132) occurred in the ten year period 1935-44, Nearly two fifths (86) occurred in the five year period 1935-39.

Niall Meehan of Griffith College's Journalism & Media Dept discovered 40 unmarked Bethany Home graves in May 2010. He subsequently discovered many more Mount Jerome Bethany graves for the period 1922–49. This information is to be published for the first time in the September-October edition of History Ireland.