‘The youth are crying out for help’
Specialists concerned as very few children have access to effective mental health intervention
Published:Wednesday | September 13, 2023 | 12:06 AMChristopher Serju/Senior Gleaner Writer
Children who are deaf or blind face an even more difficult task relating to people and accessing the necessary support as the communication barrier compounds the mental challenges they already face, according to clinical psychologist Dr Kai Morgan.
These children often also have to contend with other risk factors for suicide faced by many other youngsters, including family disruption and relationship problems; social isolation; and economic problems.
“Communicating is the number one issue for the deaf because we don’t have many persons that are actually fluent in Jamaican sign language. We have challenges with getting them access to care, so that is a problem,” Morgan, a consultant on a UNICEF project regarding children and men, noted in a Gleaner interview on Monday, a day after the commemoration of World Suicide Prevention Day 2023 under the theme ‘Creating Hope Through Action’.
“The blind have it a little bit easier because they are able to communicate [with more people more easily], but at the same time, there are struggles when it comes to assessments for them because our assessment strategies are built around visual capacities, so that is a challenge,” she added.
According to Morgan, the disabilities put the blind and deaf children at a significant disadvantage, causing many to underperform in school, noting that “it comes from the issues around their disability and around the families who don’t understand some of the things that they are dealing with”.
This situation is sometimes made worse, said Morgan, as some of the children and adolescents are also struggling with non-communicable diseases, including mental disorders.
“Preventing suicide is also about making healthy lifestyle choices, which the ministry continues to champion. A healthy lifestyle is as much about … getting adequate sleep, having a balanced diet, and nurturing healthy relationships – all of which are good for not only your physical health but also for your mental wellness, which is essential for preserving one’s life chance,” Health Minister Dr Christopher Tufton said in a message to mark World Suicide Prevention Day.
STATISTICS
Sixty-four people committed suicide in Jamaica last year, an increase on the 51 cases in 2021. Already this year, 52 people have taken their own lives.
Mental health is one of UNICEF’s key priorities for its current country programme cycle and a highlight of the work being with the Ministry of Health and Wellness to ensure a much better understanding of how it affects adolescents in particular, UNICEF health specialist Novia Condell told The Gleaner.
“UNICEF is supporting the Government in terms of improving service delivery, improving available research, and so on. One of the other key highlights is to amplify the voices of young people. What we have found, through our work on mental health, is that whenever we put out a poll on mental health, it tends to get a fairly higher volume of responses from young people than other topics. So this is clearly an issue for them that they value; they want to see it prioritised and they want to see some ideas in terms of more support for mental health,” Condell added.
Morgan said that although at least 20 per cent of the island’s children are struggling with mental health issues, only eight per cent are being reached for effective intervention.
“They are crying out for help, for better access, and the data shows that all around. The gaps are all there. The access to care is challenging in the different sectors. In the public sector, it is things like long wait lists and time; in the private sector, it’s cost,” noted Morgan.
“We are seeing challenges for them all around in terms of how they access care. So we thought along the lines of our parents, families and strengthening their capacities; strengthening the capacity in primary prevention; also, importantly, hearing their voices ... in terms of involvement in how it is that we craft any interventions.”