CWS: Real Disaster Recovery is Just Beginning

Since the catastrophic tsunami hit the coastal countries in the South East Asian, the world has been endlessly offering support to the survivors. Today a press statement from the head of the international humanitarian agency Church World Service (CWS) urged, "Don’t lose sight of the tsunami survivors now." The call has confirmed the desperate need for a long term recovery plan to be started in these countries.

Despite immediate emergency aid such as food, medical care and shelter supplies that had secured the physical lives of millions of survivors in the tsunami, CWS Executive Director Rev. John L. McCullough stressed on the psychosocial or mental health intervention that will help the broken-hearted to truly recover from the tragedy and live a new life.

"There’s no question that we have to continue to focus on the rest of the world’s suffering in places like Darfur and Haiti," McCullough says. "But we can’t afford to turn away from the Indian Ocean and perpetuate the agony of human survival there. We’ll all just have to multi-task."

Maurice Bloom, Country Director for CWS Indonesia reported, "The trauma in such devastated areas as Aceh has been complex and all-encompassing. It has integrally affected individuals, families, communities, economies, livelihoods, food security, societal supports and physical environment."

"The approach, therefore, must take place over time and calls for a more holistic, community-based solution to trauma recovery," he echoed.

Last week the World Health Organisation said almost 500,000 tsunami survivors were facing mental health problems in Indonesia's hardest-hit Aceh province, with some 200,000 or more likely to require psychiatric care.

In fact, CWS medical and mental health team travelled into the Aceh province with its mobile clinic, offering immediate person-to-person counselling and group counselling. However, language barriers have limited the contribution of foreign psychologists in immediate trauma care in Aceh.

"People under heavy depression and stress," says Dr. Julia Suryantan, CWS Indonesia’s Senior Program Officer for Health and Nutrition, "are more comfortable to speak with their own people, using their mother tongue."

In Sri Lanka, aid workers from CWS Afghanistand/Pakistan’s regional office are also focusing at least two to three years of reconstruction programs. Some reconstruction projects have already begun, working in conjunction with the Sri Lankan government and other local partners.

CWS Afghanistan/Pakistan Director Marvin Parvez noted humanitarian agencies have to respond in increasingly complex environments, "Ethnic tensions, civil war, natural disasters- these are not straight-forward disasters any more."

This week, CWS Director McCullough is going to tour Indonesia’s worst hit Aceh province to further shape the agency’s regional long-term recovery programs. He said he intentionally waited till now to start the tour.

He warned, "This is the stage when everyone’s attention tends to turn to other emergencies. It’s the stage when governments tend to forget their pledges."

He explained his purpose of the tour, "The situation was so catastrophic, we wanted to give all the space possible for international workers to be able to do what they were there for. Now, we can take a deeper look at what we most need to do to help the survivors and their communities rebuild their future."

"The work that spells real disaster recovery is just beginning," McCullough added.

Concurrently, a conference on mental health challenges after the tsunami has just started on Wednesday in Bangkok. Hundreds of healthcare professionals, academics and officials warned of trauma risk for tsunami survivors.

Jonathan Davidson, Director of the anxiety and traumatic stress programme at Duke University in the United States expected that between 50% and 90% of the population will experience symptoms such as post-traumatic stress disorder and depression.

"Recovery cannot take place unless we remain aware of the emotional effects and the mental health consequences," he said.

He encouraged survivors that even though the recovery task is expected to take years, we must believe that it can be achieved and that resilience of the human spirit can reassert itself.