The UNICEF PNG in collaboration with the Departments of Health and Education and other stakeholders have launched a Baseline Report on Child Mental health and services in PNG.
The report, ‘Strengthening Mental Health and Psychosocial Support Systems and Services for children and adolescents in East Asia and Pacific Region was produced from a research conducted by the Burnett Institute for the period from 2020 to 2021.
A very important gathering took place at the Stanley Hotel in Port Moresby today where UNICEF and partners released the report on the mental status of children in the country.
“Strengthening Mental Health and Psychosocial Support Systems and Services” for children and adolescents in East Asia and Pacific Region included results from a research done by the Burnett Institute in Papua New Guinea.
Dr. Monica Hagali, Chief Psychiatrist in the country presented statistics about the existence of child mental health at different levels in the country. In that, she raised the alarm that suicide amongst youths and adolescents is silently creeping in.
“Now the other important thing in PNG is suicide. In my opinion in PNG, suicide is happening silently. I say silently because we do not really get to know it. It is only later on that people actually talk about these things,” Dr. Hagali
The Burnett Institute- Research Team Leader, Pele Melepia shared experiences of the research on child and adolescents mental health from the findings of the research and the report presented today.
“The research project was conducted to identify how mental health social support can be implemented for children and adolescent in the EA and Pacific Region. The focus was on finding what is required for us in order to promote mental health and how can this package of service can be effectively implemented,” Melepia said.
The report showed that Mental health among young people is not discussed much and that there are no previous researches done on the subject nor records kept.