Every child, regardless of their races, tribes, religions, nationalities and beliefs, deserves secure and healthy environment throughout their developmental processes. On the contrary, refugee children deal with the exposure of war and other forms of organized violence, which forces them to leave their houses and move to the new places. Today, there are more refugees than ever before. According to UNHCR (2019), there are nearly 25.9 million refugees around the world, and over half of whom are under the age of 18. Refuge children go through a range of profound stressors during the critical times, such as armed conflict, loss or murder of family members, torture, and other forms of violence. Thus, the children face the dual stress of a traumatic past and resettlement, this later on will lead to mental health consequences to the children (Pacione, Measham, & Rousseau, 2013).
Mental health is a fundamental attribute of human being, and it is definitely crucial to ensure the mental health services for refugee children. Unaddressed trauma and mental health problems are of paramount importance as mental health issues may result in increased morbidity and mortality (Gadeberg & Norredam, 2016). Refugee children and youth, specifically those who have experienced trauma and adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), have different developmental needs than their counterparts who are not refugees (Burbage & Walker, 2018). Mental illness symptoms may not be concretely perceived from the outside, but all of these dangerous will accumulate and eventually give tremendous impact to the well-being of the affected children. Therefore, it is important to conduct adequate mental health services within the community where the refugee children live, to take care of and ensure the children’s cognitive, emotional and psychosocial development.
To avoid such adverse consequences, early detection and well-established mental health intervention for refugee children is required. Emergency mental health and psychosocial support for refugee children should be implemented in a tiered manner. Depicted visually as a pyramid, the base is dedicated to universal provision of basic services to ensure safety. The next layer of the pyramid involves strengthening community and family supports, followed by more focused non-specialized support provided to a smaller number of people. For individuals with the greatest need, specialized mental health services form the top of the pyramid. Children and youth who reached their final destination countries should be encouraged and assisted to be integrated into the system; provide them with services, regular education program or any other necessary support. This later on will lead to the sense of belonging which helps the refugee children to reach recovery as soon as possible (Kronick, 2018; Inter-Agency Standing Committee, 2019).
REFERENCES
The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. (2019). Figures at a Glance: Statistical Yearbooks. Retrieved October 11, 2019, from https://www.unhcr.org/figures-at-a- glance.html.
Pacione, L., Measham, T., & Rousseau, C. (2013). Refugee children: Mental health and effective interventions. Current psychiatry reports, 15(2), 341.
Kronick, R. (2018). Mental health of refugees and asylum seekers: assessment and intervention. The Canadian Journal of Psychiatry, 63(5), 290–296.
Burbage, M. L. and D. K. Walker. 2018. A call to strengthen mental health supports for refugee children and youth. NAM Perspectives. Commentary, National Academy of Medicine, Washington, DC. doi: 10.31478/201808a.
Inter-Agency Standing Committee. (2019). IASC Guidelines on Mental Health and Psychosocial Support in Emergency Settings, ISBN 978–1–4243–3444–5. Retrieved October 11, 2019 from https://www.refworld.org/docid/4e97ceca2.html.
Gadeberg, A. K., & Norredam, M. (2016). Urgent need for validated trauma and mental health screening tools for refugee children and youth.European child & adolescent psychiatry, 25(8), 929–931.
