Following the alarming rate of suicide cases in Laikipia County, the government has been urged to intervene and create mental health awareness in bid to reverse the worrying trend.
Mental health stakeholders speaking at a Nanyuki hotel Friday decried that the majority of people and especially the youth were fighting mental illnesses attributed to harsh economic times, drug abuse and family feuds that result in suicides.
A Counselling Psychologist Dr. Susan Gitau said that, since the Covid-19 pandemic struck the country in March 2020, there have been a sharp rise in mental health issues that need urgent action for instance training of Community Health Volunteers (CHVs) to help people at the grassroots in addressing the big challenge.
“If we want to care for every family, CHVs must be involved by the government; they have a lot of knowledge, and all they need is basic skills on mental health. With that, they can help at the grassroots level,” said Gitau, adding CHVs also needed facilitation for seamless service delivery.
She pointed out that treating mental illness was expensive and therefore there was a need to arrest the situation among communities on time since a majority of families couldn’t afford it.
“Prevention is better than cure since psychiatric treatment is very expensive and can go up to Sh.60, 000 per session which most of families can’t afford. Even the government has not allocated sufficient funding for mental health,” she said.
An institution keen on addressing mental health problems in Laikipia, Magnificent Wellness Centre Director Ms. Treza Uduny said that she was triggered to hold the mental health stakeholders’ engagement aimed at finding solutions on how to create awareness and help residents to avert committing suicide.
“The reason this came to my mind is due to sharp increase of suicide cases in Nanyuki, which at a particular time, we would count up to eight cases in a week especially among the males,” revealed Uduny.
A recent suicidal case is that of a 30-year-old woman identified as Irene Makandi from Katheri location in the outskirts of Nanyuki town who committed suicidal eight days ago to be interred together with her departed sister who died after short illness at the Nanyuki Teaching and Referral Hospital. She left behind suicide notes that shocked the village.
A youth Ms. Mary Wangari said that the training came at a good time since they were offered a chance to speak out about the challenges they faced in mental health that led them to commit suicide. She at the same time reiterated that, a majority of youth was involved in drug and substance abuse.
“Mental health is critical especially among the youth since they are most affected. We have seen people suffering from depression, drug and substance abuse. Therefore, such forums offer us an opportunity to speak out about our challenges hoping to get help,” said Wangari.
Another youth Ms. Alice Wambui on her part said that there was a need to sensitize the youth on mental health often to guard them against committing suicide.
Meanwhile, according to World Health Organization (WHO) data, over 700,000 people commit suicide globally, which translates to one suicide in 40 seconds. Estimates indicate that there are about four cases of suicide deaths per day in Kenya that are associated with depression and anxiety disorder.
The data from WHO reveals that, for every suicide, 20 people make an attempt and many others have serious thoughts of killing self. The majority are youth aged 15-29 years old.
However, Kenya and other low-income and middle-income countries have scanty information about suicides due to poor reporting system on suicide mortalities.
The Ministry of Health in its suicide prevention strategy 2021 to 2026, targets to reduce the mortalities attributed to mental illness by 10 percent before 2026.
The training forum was supported by the Magnificent Wellness Centre.
By Muturi Mwangi
