Aceh's mentally ill suffer after being affected by tsunami
Aceh's mentally ill suffer after being affected by tsunami
Dan Eaton, Reuters/Banda Aceh
Feared by their relatives and locked away for hours every day, life was never easy for patients at the only mental hospital in Indonesia's tsunami-devastated Aceh province.
But the giant waves that tore through the provincial capital, Banda Aceh, the day after Christmas swamped the dilapidated collection of low-rise hospital buildings several kilometres from the sea.
The tsunami that killed tens of thousands in the city filled the 300-bed facility with thick black mud that is only now being shovelled out by Australian soldiers.
The lives of those who inhabit the concrete cells and wards will take much longer to rebuild.
Some traumatized patients climbed trees to escape the water, while the rest fled into Banda Aceh, doctors told Reuters. Of 350 hospital patients, only about 140 have returned after the earthquake and tsunami. Many are filthy and wild-eyed.
They have been joined by about a dozen people suffering trauma from the tsunami, the first of many health officials expect to need help after a disaster that left more than 230,000 Indonesians dead or missing.
"The shock caused by extreme life events such as disasters can express itself as mental disorders, depression and sleeplessness," said Dr Kris, chief of medical services at Banda Aceh Mental Hospital.
The Dec. 26 earthquake and tsunami struck more than a dozen nations around the Indian Ocean rim, leaving nearly 300,000 dead or missing from Thailand to Somalia.
As many as 90 percent of survivors may have suffered psychological trauma. Children are most at risk, mental health experts said at a meeting in Thailand this month. Tens of thousands would need either medication or counselling by doctors, relatives and religious leaders, they said. Help may be on the way.
The Turkish Red Crescent Society, already working with the World Food Programme to provide emergency relief to the hospital's patients, said it was in talks with the government about building a new facility.
"There is a proposal for the construction of a new hospital building, but in the first three months they need emergency things like food," said Bulent Ozturk, an official from the Turkish group working at the hospital.
He said plans included a new trauma centre to cope with an influx of tsunami-related patients, but said it could be more than a year before the new building is ready.
Kris said the number of patients at his hospital was set to rocket as dozens of aid groups and foreign armies wound down medical operations at makeshift refugee camps.
A 2002 survey showed many Acehnese already suffered trauma after nearly 30 years of rebellion in the province, he said.
"I think it will rise three or four times from the tsunami," Kris said, but he added the stigma of mental illness may keep some needy people away.
"We already had a trauma centre, but nobody came, because they thought if they come here it means they are mad," Kris said.
REUTERS
GetRTR 3.00 -- FEB 12, 2005 09:19:34