Jones says that after his arrival on Nauru on August 5, 2018, many of the children aged 11, 12 and 13 he was treating had been detained for five years. Their every moment – showers, meal times, movements – was timed and monitored by Australian contractors in ways they say were humiliating and debilitating. All were called by their boat number, not their name – a policy he denounces as dehumanising.