Almost two years after the Helsinki peace accord was signed,
Acehnese civilians continue to suffer a high rate of combat trauma,
according to a study of conflict-related trauma and depression
carried out by IOM and Harvard researchers.



The assessment which evaluates the mental health needs of people
affected by the 29-year conflict between Indonesian security forces
and the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) was conducted with assistance from
Syiah Kuala University, the Indonesian Health Department and funded
by the World Bank, the Decentralization Support Facility, Harvard
University and IOM.



The assessment, conducted in high-conflict communities across 14 of
19 districts of Aceh, found that 35 per cent ranked high on
symptoms for depression, 10 per cent for Post-Traumatic Stress
Disorder (PTSD) and 39 per cent for anxiety.



Nearly three quarters (74 per cent) of the randomly selected sample
of the 1972 civilians from 105 villages reported living through
combat, 28 per cent had experienced beatings, and 38 per cent had a
family member or friend killed during the conflict.



Civilians in South Aceh and along Aceh’s East coast
experienced even higher rates of traumatic events, and as a
consequence display high levels of symptoms for mental illnesses.
For example, 41 per cent of villagers surveyed from the south and
west coast were suffering high rates of depression, 43 per cent
from anxiety symptoms while 14 per cent had PTSD symptoms.



A Psychosocial Needs Assessment of Conflict-Affected Communities in
14 Districts of Aceh was not designed to catalogue or identify
groups or individuals allegedly responsible for causing trauma.




But the report’s authors say that this traumatized portion of
Aceh’s population could be possible triggers for further
violence if left untreated.



“These memories are alive in the community and they have the
tremendous power to reproduce that violence. These traumatized
individuals can become stressors for the rest of their
community,” said Professor Byron Good from the
Harvard’s School of Social Medicine and one of the
report’s authors.



The report calls on the Indonesian government to fund desperately
needed mental health services as well as on the international
community involved in Aceh’s post-tsunami reconstruction to
incorporate psychosocial care as part of their programmes.



“This report shows that many civilians in Aceh, where one of
South-East Asia’s long running conflicts has raged until
recently, are in urgent need of specialized mental health
care,” said Professor Good. “Developing a mental health
system that reaches these traumatized individuals, who are often
located in remote, widely dispersed villages, is essential for
Aceh’s future.”



In response to results from this study, the British
government’s Department for International Development (DFID)
through a World Bank multi-donor fund, has agreed to fund
IOM’s outreach mental health programme in Bireuen and North
Aceh. The programme will target 3,000 individuals over a 12-month
period.



“This unique mobile programme, which provides both basic
health care and psychosocial care, will provide an important
service to remote villages in two of Aceh’s most
conflict-affected districts,” said Steve Cook, IOM’s
chief of mission in Indonesia.



In response to the results of a smaller assessment of Aceh’s
mental health needs carried out in three districts in 2006 and
which revealed that civilians there displayed levels of
combat-related trauma comparable to those found during the Balkan
war, IOM launched a six-month outreach health programme in Bireuen.




Since January 2007, IOM mobile clinics, which work together with
the government community health centres or puskesmas, have targeted
14,000 people, 581 of whom were suffering from mental illnesses.




The report is available in both English and Bahasa Indonesia on
class="paragraph-link-no-underline" href="http://www.iom.or.id"
target="_blank" title="">www.iom.or.id



For more information, please call

Marianne Kearney

IOM Banda Aceh

Tel. +62-812 698 9308

Email: "mailto:mkearney@iom.int">mkearney@iom.int