{"id":19914,"date":"2019-12-23T20:42:04","date_gmt":"2019-12-23T15:12:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/kashmir.today\/?p=19914"},"modified":"2019-12-23T20:42:04","modified_gmt":"2019-12-23T15:12:04","slug":"mental-illness-cases-on-rise-across-kashmir-post-aug-5-say-experts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kashmir.watch\/?p=19914","title":{"rendered":"Mental illness cases on rise across Kashmir post Aug 5, say experts"},"content":{"rendered":"

One in five common Kashmiris have PTSD symptoms, reveals 2015 Study, experts say number has gone up of late<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Srinagar, Dec 23:<\/em><\/strong> The ongoing internet suspension and the three month long clampdown since August 5 has added to the already traumatized people of Kashmir as the number of people with various psychiatric ailments has shown a steep rise in the past five months.<\/em><\/p>\n

According to wire service\u2014Kashmir News Observer (KNO), nearly one in five people in Kashmir shows symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTST), according to a 2015 study by M\u00e9decins Sans Fronti\u00e8res and the Srinagar-based Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences, or IMHANS.<\/em><\/p>\n

Dr. Arshad Hussain, a psychiatrist who co-authored the Action-Aid study, calls Kashmir one of the \u201csaddest places in the world\u201d.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cThe chaos that Kashmir has witnessed over the years has definitely deepened this problem,\u201d he said. The situation has escalated as the clampdown coupled with the internet shutdown has added more to the figures of mentally sick patients.<\/em><\/p>\n

The Kashmir valley has been on lockdown since 5 August, when Centre rolled back Article 370 and imposed curfews, cutting off communications on all platforms.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cIf the instability and violence don\u2019t subside mental health disorders are going to increase,\u201d said Hussain.<\/em><\/p>\n

The IMHANS and Action-Aid study estimated only 6.4 percent of people with a mental illness had seen a psychiatrist, and only 12.6 percent sought any kind of healthcare help at all. Hussain, the study\u2019s co-author, says this is partly to blame on stigma and a poor understanding of mental illness.<\/em><\/p>\n

An October paper by a group of academics and activists researching the crackdown in Kashmir reported that the programme was functional in only two districts amid \u201can acute shortage of psychiatrists\u201d across Kashmir.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cIt will be highly surprising if a few months from now we do not find extraordinarily high rates of PTSD,\u201d wrote Dr. Anirudh Kala, a psychiatrist and one of the paper\u2019s researchers.<\/em><\/p>\n

For Fatima, a resident of Ompora, Budgam, her son has been declared mentally unwell with chronic symptoms of PTSD. \u201cMy son started behaving abnormally post August 5 and now he is being counselled and is on a drug,\u201d she said. \u201cI am not able to find out what happened to him. He gets irritated over small issues and starts breaking everything that comes into his way. His is just 10.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

An official at the directorate of Health Services Kashmir, while talking to KNO admitted that mental health programmes are limited and said that it\u2019s still a goal to make district-level treatment more widely available. \u201cWe are working on it,\u201d he said, wishing not to be named. (KNO)<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One in five common Kashmiris have PTSD symptoms, reveals 2015 Study, experts say number has gone up of late Srinagar, Dec 23: The ongoing internet suspension and the three month long clampdown since August 5 has added to the already traumatized people of Kashmir as the number of people with various psychiatric ailments has shown […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19914","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-union-territory"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kashmir.watch\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19914","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kashmir.watch\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kashmir.watch\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kashmir.watch\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kashmir.watch\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=19914"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/kashmir.watch\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19914\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kashmir.watch\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=19914"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kashmir.watch\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=19914"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kashmir.watch\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=19914"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}