Mental health is the silent wave of the pandemic. It is clear, the social silence is a desperate cry. Pitiusa Pro Mental Health Association (Apfem) and the Asperger Association Ibiza and Formentera, participated in a meeting yesterday with the Balearic Health Councillor, Patricia Gomez, and the coordinator of Mental Health, Oriol Lafau, one of the events planned during this week, which on Sunday marks World Mental Health Day .
“We are overwhelmed. The pandemic has led to the emergence of many undiagnosed cases,” says Antonella Greco, manager of Apfem. Among them, “many very young people with self-harming ideas, boys of 18 or 19 years with mood disorders,” says the head of the organisation, which precisely for this reason plans to conduct a specific course for its professionals on emotional regulation. The aim is to try to better serve this new profile of person who comes asking for help and for whom there is no specific resource. They cannot include them in their initiatives because they do not have a disability or a diagnosis, the suicide prevention programme is not adequate either.
“It’s very complicated”, recognizes Greco, who also highlights how the situation of the last year and a half has led to an increase in substance abuse by some of its users. “I avoid it,” they tell you. But when one tells you they drive their car at high speed on the road and another that almost hit their grandmother, you see that there is a problem,” details the manager of the association, which notes that the pandemic “has put us in check”, increasing the problems of anxiety, depression and fear of socializing. “It’s the fear of enjoyment,” says the manager of Apfem, which considers a closed center of dual pathology to serve people with mental disorders and addictions necessary. “There is a day center but not a closed one and we have very serious cases that we can not have in our sheltered housing,” she says.
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