Sri Lanka is a country with a large mental health problem. As well as the fact that mental health services have been ignored and under funded in the health system, the long-term, ongoing, violent civil war has caused lots of mental trauma and one of the highest suicide rates in the world.

On top of these problems, the devastation wrought by the Tsunami on Boxing Day 2004 caused immeasurable pain and grief, which still persists today.

The government has not been meeting the needs of mentally ill people. Money that is spent on mental health only really goes to the large mental health institutions in capital cities, which are inaccessible and do not provide appropriate care for mentally ill people. Mentally ill people have to make long and stressful journeys to access these services.

The government does provide free drugs to people that come under its care, but hospitals have to meet other mental health expenditure (including drugs that are not on the government’s list) from its own budget, and this can mean charging for treatment.

Also, mentally ill people do not qualify for disability benefits from the government, even though the government classes mental illnesses as a disability. This means that they have to be supported by their families whilst they are ill, causing a great financial and material burden on their relatives. This can be very difficult in poor households and leads to a lot of stigma surrounding mental illnesses.

There is only 1 psychiatrist for every 500,000 people in Sri Lanka and most of these live in urban areas, in particular the capital, Colombo. Most non-medical mental health professionals, e.g. social workers, have little formal training in mental health so they are not properly qualified to offer the level of support that mentally ill people need.

The first BasicNeeds programme in Sri Lanka started in 2002, with a work shop held in Thalawa in Angunukolapalessa. Since then, we have now expanded to cover seven districts, including Hambanatota and Matara, which were badly affected by the Tsunami.

Providing community-based treatment is a large part of our work in Sri Lanka. Mental health camps and outreach clinics are held so that mentally ill people and their families can easily access the treatment they so desperately need within their own communities. This means that the hardships faced from travelling long distances to access treatment are no longer a barrier to a full recovery and the chance of a normal life.

We are working closely with the government to improve their mental health services. For example, drugs that mentally ill people need are now provided at a larger range of hospitals and the few psychiatrists that are in the country now travel to more hospitals, meaning that more mentally ill people can get the help they need.

One of the problems that mentally ill people tell us of over and over again is the lack of jobs, which stop them from having a full and stable recovery and the chance to work themselves out of poverty. To help mentally ill people have the chance of getting a normal life again we run successful micro-credit and home gardening programmes.

These programmes have helped mentally ill people develop a regular monthly income and also, with the home garden programme, a source of food, too. As well as giving money, we also provide training in business skills. These have helped mentally ill people successfully manage and grow their businesses.

Kanchana had been suffering from depression but was successfully treated. She then joined the home gardens programme. She got funding for her garden and training in enterprise and business skills. Within the last 6 months she was able to grow and sell 2,400 lime plants bringing her highest ever income, 17,000 Sri Lankan Rupees (£95). Her mother said that this is the highest amount of money the family has ever seen. Not bad for someone who only months before had been suffering from depression.

Community volunteers are vital to the programmes in Sri Lanka. Volunteers include both mentally ill people and other members of the community. Volunteers take a large and active role in organising events and activities of the programme, such as mental health camps and consultation meetings.

Each volunteer is given a mentally ill person to be responsible for. The volunteer then checks their progress and visits them regularly to ensure that the mentally ill person is complying with their medication intake. At the mental health camps, the volunteer then sits with the patient on their visit with the psychiatrist and is there when the medication is dispensed so that they can report and problems and they know exactly what the mentally ill person should be taking.

So far we have helped 6,632 mentally ill people in Sri Lanka transform their lives and have the chance of normal future.

Currently, Sri Lanka is expanding its operation into all the areas of the south and north of the country. This will bring us into contact with a lot of people who have been displaced from their homes and communities by the war and by the Tsunami.

Sri Lanka is also the home of our International Training Programme >>

We work closely with partner organisations, who help us reach out to help mentally ill people far beyond the limits of our organisation. Our partner organisations in Sri Lanka are:

• Navajeevana
• Giruwapattu Development Square (GIDES)
• Divisional Secretariat – Embilipitiya
• Developers (working in the Eastern Province)

Sri Lanka
Vanee Surendranathan , Programme Manager
600/3, Nawala Road, Rajagiriya, Sri Lanka
Tel: + 94 11 2871418 – 2871801-2871419 Fax: + 94 11 2871377