Researchers Find Many Refugees Need Better Mental Health Care
Researchers, charities, and scientists found that governmental asylum policies need to respect the fact that many refugees experience mental distress.
On 6th November, a team from The Research for Health in Conflict Project at The University of Cambridge published two videos showing findings from a study exploring migrant mental health.
The researchers said governments needed to give refugees equal access to health facilities without harming local communities.
In the films, refugees show they experience added trouble getting health support in the UK, even after traveling across Europe and living with uncertain legal status. According to the videos, these challenges hurt their vulnerable mental state more.
Dr. Adam Coutts, from the Department of Psychiatry and Centre for Business Research at the University of Cambridge, said, “In the media and political hubbub surrounding the crisis, the lives, personal stories and mental health and wellbeing of migrants, refugees and asylum seekers are absent. We wanted to show the reality of the situation for these people and the challenges they face.”
In 2019, scientists, including Kerstin Spanhel, Professor from the University of Freiburg’s Department of Rehabilitation Psychology and Psychotherapy, found that trauma makes refugees “vulnerable” to other mental health disorders.
She said this vulnerability is, “due to burdening and potentially traumatizing events in their home countries, during the flight, and in the countries of arrival.”
Spanhel continued that there are several barriers to refugees getting the help they need. She said that stigma and countries’ faulty treatment structures hurt refugees.
She continued,
“Providing appropriate, early, and ongoing mental health care to refugees and asylum seekers benefits not only the individual but the host nation.”
‘Inadequate Funding’ for Sheltering Refugees.
The latest report by The European Union Agency for Asylum (EUAA) said that in 2022, despite some nations letting in more refugees than before, they needed to give them more shelter.
The study found, “Some countries surpassed all previous capacity records, but this still was not enough to offer adequate accommodation.”
It discovered that governments sometimes caused these problems through “inadequate funding methods and issues in collaborating” with other countries.
It’s widely known that homelessness and poverty cause trauma. Trauma’s knock-on-affects include PTSD.
The Royal College for Psychiatrists estimates that 31% of displaced people have PTSD, including children.
In the UK, according to charity Refugee Council, the government isn’t giving asylum-seekers enough to help their mental health.
Charity Refugee Council says, “The Home Office provides accommodation on a no-choice basis and subsistence support of £6.43 per day for people seeking asylum.”
The organization added that asylum-seekers aren’t allowed to work, so many have to survive off the Home Office’s payment.
The British government said, “We’re determined to do everything we can to support children and young people with their mental health, no matter their background or location.”
And, on 4th October, Fernando Grande-Marlaska Gómez, acting Spanish minister for home affairs, said the EU had improved their refugee policies.
One change will allow those nations with a refugee crisis to request solidarity resources from other EU members. Grande-Marlaska Gómez called this a “huge step forward” for solving the issue.
Refugees in Numbers
In July, the EUAA revealed that refugee numbers were at “historic highs,” partly due to Russia invading Ukraine.
The write-up said, “ongoing conflicts, climate shocks, geopolitical unrest, violence and persecution, led millions of people to flee their homes in 2022.” It added,
“The Russian invasion of Ukraine caused one of the fastest and largest forced displacement crises since World War II.”
The researchers found that the combined global crises meant approximately “103 million” displaced people in 2022.
Want to follow the UK refugee crisis more closely? If so, read our other article, David Cameron Appointed Foreign Secretary as Suella Braverman Sacked.
