Twenty-five percent of Neno Population is reportedly mentally sick, Partners in Health discloses.
This translates to 40,000 people who are mentally ill out of the 160,000 population.
The local NGO has made the revelation today at Neno Community Centre Ground during the commemoration of World Mental Health Day.
Findings further indicate that 30 percent of patients attending an outpatient clinic in Neno met the criteria for depression, which results in mental health.
Partners in Health is leading various government departments in commemorating the day in Neno which falls on October 10 annually.
This year’s theme is “Mental Health in an Unequal World: Together we can make a difference”.-MBC ONLINE
Ah ah. I think this illustrates more how NGOs work: they said they did a survey, but in fact they just took WHO data. It is very likely the WHO data refers to the number of people (in general globally) who will have a mental health problem some time during their life ie depression anxiety, suicidal thoughts etc. This is about 1 in 4 people.
Of course partners in health took this out of context for a poltical reason: to get donor funding. For many NGOs their main job is raising funds to pay their inflated salaries that are not at all representative of local economies. For many NGOs Malawi is a sales tool.. selling poverty to get donor cash.