LILONGWE CWED SELECTED SCHOOLS TO LAUNCH MENTAL HEALTH CLUBS TO ADDRESS RISING CASES

The Global Health Corps, hopes the introduction of mental health learners clubs in various schools can play a crucial role in addressing mental health problems in the country .

 

The organization’s Country Director Symon Simkoko, says as the country is facing a rise in mental health problems, it is critical for authorities to bang heads and come up with strategies likely to improve the situation.

 

“It is so clear that the numbers of mental health cases are rising, particularly the suicide cases. Yesterday, we had a meeting with the ministry of health and they indicated that there’s a rise mainly amongst the young people”

“So if there is a rise in cases of suicide, which is quite a big sign of mental health, it means we need to take a step and start targeting schools”

 

Simkoko is hopeful that taking mental health concepts to schools will provide a platform for learners to have interactive sessions where they can share personal challenges, some of the coping resilience and improve their performance in school.

 

During the training of the trainers workshop on Saturday at Bwaila Secondary School in Lilongwe, Esther Tauzi, a teacher at Lilongwe girls secondary school and also a member of psycho social group, mentioned some issues that pose to be a trap for students to find themselves in mental health challenges.

 

“Like our school, it’s a boarding school. One of the major challenges sometimes is their needs in terms of groceries, they don’t have pocket money, sometimes other students are coming from one parent family and most of the time they say maybe I’m thinking of what is happening at home, you hear issues of divorces at home, they affect the students”

 

“Even performance itself, they also take it to mental health because when they think maybe like Lilongwe girls secondary school it’s a national secondary school, they expect to have high grades and when they see lower grade, it affects that particular student”

 

In her remarks, Faridah Zalimba, cited that students sometimes fail to share their personal challenges with others due to trust issues.

 

Zalimba hopes that having such trainings can help to address mental health problems among students in the country.

“It’s really helpful because through these sessions, people attend or engage with others, chilling, that helps us to clear our minds a lot. Some have, like, some exercises and some other stuff like that” she explained.

 

Representatives from 11 selected secondary schools from Lilongwe central west education division, have been trained to train others on mental health through the clubs that will be formed in their schools.