Pakistan has no credible record or database that has statistics of children suffering mental distress, trafficking, sexual abuse, said Andrew Robert Duggan pursuing doctorate in Child Resiliency from University of Huddersfield.
He, while speaking at the workshop titled “Developing critical thinking skills amongst professionals working with children and young people”, said that children and youth constitute 65 percent of Pakistan’s population, but the professionals working with them severely lack awareness. Andrew said that according to a questionnaire sent to hospitals in Lahore, 90 percent pediatricians reported having no formal training in child mental health while only 16 percent felt confident in assessing it.
He said that 90 percent reported not being aware of international Classification System regarding child mental health and 79 percent reported that a psychiatric diagnosis in a child is stigmatising. One of the major issues highlighted in the session was that about 71 percent people reported that they had no awareness of national guidelines around child protection issues.
The session was told that the child mental health is one of the key areas according to the National Health Strategy, yet there was no database or research available on the subject. Speaking on mental health issues amongst children, he stressed that the child was not the problem, the disease affecting him was and all effort must be put in ridding the child of the problem, adding that a collaborative relationship was compulsory in the treatment of a child.
He said that Pakistan has no record or database that has statistics of children suffering mental distress, trafficking and sexual abuse.