According to experts, traumatized Ukrainian refugees who have sought refuge in the United Kingdom may have to wait two years before receiving specialized therapy to help them recover from the horrors of war.
Therapists who specialize in treating war injuries say they have seen NHS waiting lists for two years before refugees have access to the specialized treatment they need.
Services in the UK are uneven, with some areas “inadequate for treatment when it comes to trauma”, according to Emily Palmer-White, a psychotherapist and community manager at the charity Room to Heal, which provides support for people fleeing persecution. .
“There are often extremely long waiting lists. I was told two years. “You can’t separate the psychological from the practical – it’s harder to help people if they’re busy surviving,” Palmer-White said.
A spokesman for the Ministry of Health and Social Welfare said officials acknowledged the trauma the Ukrainians were facing and stood side by side with them. However, apart from access to the NHS, officials do not cite any specific provision for the provision of newly arrived refugees with traumatic support.
Professor Cornelius Catona of the Royal College of Psychiatrists said delaying the visa for several weeks was likely to worsen the mental illness of those already struggling, and that refugee schemes should have included a mechanism to detect signs of trauma early.
Victoria Liamets, a Ukrainian pediatric and family therapist who recently arrived in the UK after fleeing the war, said Ukrainians arriving in Britain had many and complex traumas to deal with.
“People are shocked when they leave what they call home,” Liametz said. “Some left elderly parents and other family members with only a small backpack because they thought they would be back soon. There are so many layers of trauma that it takes some time to process. People need to be in a safe environment before they can start doing this. But being in a new country with a new language and no income can make them feel vulnerable. Your whole internal structure becomes unstable. ”
She said children could be particularly hard hit by fleeing the war to the point where it could even change their personality.
Kirsty McNeill, executive director of Save the Children UK, said there was a worrying lack of mental health support for “incredibly traumatized” children arriving from Ukraine.
She said: “By definition, these children are traumatized. The speed with which their lives are falling apart is something that needs specialized support to come to terms with. There are children who went to school normally on Mondays and sat on the floor in a Romanian gym over the weekend. Their lives turned upside down in one week. We do not see any real urgency on the part of the UK Government to increase specialized support for mental health, nor do we see many new recruits.
Prof. William Yull, an honorary professor of applied child psychology at King’s College London and an expert on child stress and trauma and the needs of refugees, said: “The situation in Ukraine is incredibly complicated. One of the important things to remember there is that the war started in 2014. People can be both saddened and traumatized if they see relatives killed. “
He said children should be allowed to speak and be heard if they wanted to talk about the war, adding that much experience had been gained in dealing with the traumatic stress of post-war work in the former Yugoslavia. two decades ago.
Add Comment