Abstract
A well‐known medical journal, The Lancet, recently published an important systematic review and meta‐analysis of mental disorder estimates in conflict settings, advocating for the scaling up of mental health interventions in such contexts. However, there is an assumption that the introduction of such treatments has no significant impact, except from a therapeutic one, in the settings they have been imported to. The authors' research in post‐conflict northern Uganda analyzed the social impact of mental health interventions addressing post‐traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and showed that promoting trauma has had considerable socio‐economic ramifications on the wider society. The introduction of trauma narratives has created a market where some are able to thrive, but many deeply troubled individuals remain invisible. The authors found no social benefits from promoting trauma, and few positive effects for individuals. Arguments for urgently upscaling mental health interventions of the kinds highlighted by the review in The Lancet, and which the authors have observed on the ground, should be treated with caution.
Highlights
Costanza Torre and Tim Allen are at the London School of Economics and Political Science
A hard homecoming: Lessons learned from the reception centre process on effective interventions for former ‘abductees’ in northern Uganda
Some academic anthropologists are more open to using internationalized psychiatric labels than others, and people with an undergraduate or postgraduate training in anthropology may work with agencies running therapy projects or related psychosocial support schemes
Summary
Costanza Torre and Tim Allen are at the London School of Economics and Political Science. A well-known medical journal, The Lancet, has recently published an important systematic review and metaanalysis of mental disorder estimates in conflict settings by Charlson et al (2019) It will replace World Health Organization assessments that are more than a decade old, and the new data is set to find its way into various kinds of reports and articles, substantially informing international policy and practice (see e.g. The New Humanitarian 2019; ICMHPSCS 2019). Some academic anthropologists are more open to using internationalized psychiatric labels than others, and people with an undergraduate or postgraduate training in anthropology may work with agencies running therapy projects or related psychosocial support schemes. Is this anthropological openness to dominant mental health paradigms a positive step? We suggest it is not
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