Treatment for eating disorders is poor or non-existent in many areas of Britain, with doctors stereotyping sufferers as attention-seekers who are to blame for their illness.

More than 40 per cent of GPs fail to meet government guidelines on identifying the illness or do not act quickly enough once the diagnosis has been made, according to the first report into the treatment of eating disorders across the country. More than half of sufferers are not seen by a specialist and only 17 per cent are treated in an appropriate setting.

'One third of local health authorities across the UK have no specialist treatment services, which results in lower levels of expertise leading to poorer recovery outcomes,' said Susan Ringwood, chief executive of the Eating Disorders Association.

'This also means a great deal of travelling for sufferers and their carers and an absence of support generally,' she said. 'This unfortunate situation must be resolved quickly to prevent more young lives being lost to these deadly disorders.'

Ringwood will present the highly critical report at the House of Commons tomorrow to launch Eating Disorders Awareness Week. The report, which surveyed 1,700 sufferers, carers and professionals, compares the treatment being delivered with the National Institute for Clinical Excellence (Nice) guidelines developed in January 2004.

'More people are coming forward for treatment and help and the specialist services across the UK are becoming overwhelmed with referrals. The result is long waiting lists and, often, reduced treatment plans to address the problem or, worse, emergency admissions into already stretched medical wards,' said Ringwood.

'This short-term crisis management overlooks the real and growing future requirement for eating disorders services. We welcomed the Nice guidelines when they were published just over a year ago but we are very concerned that, across the NHS, services are still very patchy and some areas have little or no service provision.'

Jo, 21, developed anorexia when she went to boarding school at 14. After her weight fell two stones, to eight and a half stones, the school doctor sent her to a cognitive behavioural therapist.

'I did not realise what I was doing even had a name,' she said. 'I just thought I was disgusting, which made it worse. It took massive courage for me to seek help but the therapist was totally useless. She belittled me and ridiculed my problems, and instead of getting better, I got worse.'

Jo saw the therapist for two years until she left school with two C-grade A-levels. 'Had I been able to recover in time, I would have got an education, would be confident and in control of my life,' she said. 'Instead, I developed bulimia and then began to self-harm.'

Three years ago, Jo found a psychiatrist who she felt helped her but when the psychiatrist moved last year, Jo was told she would have to put her name on a six-month waiting list to see someone else.

'Now I pay £25 a fortnight to see a private counsellor who is good but not ideal,' said Jo. 'I have had to fight every step of the way to get treatment. If I had not fought, I would now be dead but even with all my efforts to get well, the treatment I have received has been pretty bad.'

Professor Janet Treasure, of the Institute of Psychiatry, King's College London, and the eating disorders unit at South London and Maudsley NHS Hospital, recently published a study into time trends in eating disorders in the British Journal of Psychiatry.

'In too many areas of the country, the situation is terrible,' she said. 'I met a 51-year-old woman recently who has suffered eating disorders since she was 12 years old, and seen two family members die from the illness. She has spent decades trying to get help and is frightened she is going to die but last week her GP told her she was too old to treat and then refused to sign a sick note for her, even though her body mass index is half what it should be.

'It is a hard illness for GPs to diagnose and treat, and many are doing an excellent job,' she said. 'But there are others who still cling to the stigmatising prejudices of the past and blame sufferers, instead of recognising the seriousness of the illness.'

The Eating Disorders Association survey shows that even when GPs are quick to diagnose eating disorders, there are insufficient facilities for treatment: in some parts of the UK the nearest service is 150 miles away, while in others sufferers are placed in psychiatric wards or treated merely for their physical symptoms, with little or no specialist psychiatric help.