Small funding can make a big difference
short-term outcomes of five projects linking livelihoods with mental health and well-being in torture-survivors
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.7146/torture.v34i2.141456Keywords:
livelihoods, MHPSS, psychosocial, wellbeing, outcomes, torture, survivors, indicators, therapeutic, socioeconomic supportAbstract
Half of all survivors of torture (SOT) worldwide live in poverty. When treating SOT, rehabilitation and mental health treatment cannot be expected to work independent from supplemental support (specifically livelihoods) ensuring that individuals’ most basic needs are met (Mukwege and Berg, 2016; Patel, 2019).
It is said that rehabilitating SOT without livelihoods support is comparable to “a car without wheels.” For instance, a doctor may inform a patient that they must eat prior to taking their medications, unknowing of the patient’s lack of reliable access to food. Or, a SOT may attend weekly sessions for counselling to no avail as they return to a home without sufficient food for the family— another stressor deterring focus from rehabilitation.
References
Aerne, A., & Bonoli, G. (2023). Integration through vocational training: Promoting refugees’ access to apprenticeships in a collective skill formation system. Journal of Vocational Education & Training, 75(3), 419–438. https://doi.org/10.1080/13636820.2021.1894219
Abdel Jabbar, S., & Zaza, H. I. (2016). Evaluating a vocational training programme for women refugees at the Zaatari camp in Jordan: Women empowerment: A journey and not an output. International Journal of Adolescence and Youth, 21(3), 304–319. https://doi.org/10.1080/02673843.2015.1077716
Carlsson, J. M., Mortensen, E. L., & Kastrup, M. (2006). Predictors of mental health and quality of life in male tortured refugees. Nordic Journal of Psychiatry, 60(1), 51–57. https://doi.org/10.1080/08039480500504982
Cole, S. M., & Tembo, G. (2011). The effect of food insecurity on mental health: Panel evidence from rural Zambia. Social Science & Medicine, 73(7), 1071–1079. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2011.07.012
Dagar, P. (2022). Evaluating and reframing vocational education and training for refugees: Insights from five refugee groups across three cities of India. Compare: A Journal of Comparative and International Education. https://doi.org/10.1080/03057925.2022.2078957
Devkota, S. P. (2015). Necessity of technical and vocational education for conflict victims. Journal of Training and Development, 1(1), 27–32. https://doi.org/10.3126/jtd.v1i0.13087
Hilal, R. (2012). Vocational education and training for women and youth in Palestine: Poverty reduction and gender equality under occupation. International Journal of Educational Development, 32(5), 686–695. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijedudev.2012.02.008
Hess, J. M., Isakson, B. L., Amer, S., Ndaheba, E., Baca, B., & Goodkind, J. R. (2019). Refugee mental health and healing: Understanding the impact of policies of rapid economic self-sufficiency and the importance of meaningful work. Journal of International Migration and Integration, 20(3), 769–786. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12134-018-0628-3
Kumar, S., & Willman, A. (2016). Healing invisible wounds and rebuilding livelihoods: Emerging lessons for combining livelihood and psychosocial support in fragile and conflict-affected settings. Journal of Public Health Policy, 37(S1), 32–50. https://doi.org/10.1057/s41271-016-0009-0
Lai, H., Due, C., & Ziersch, A. (2022). The relationship between employment and health for people from refugee and asylum-seeking backgrounds: A systematic review of quantitative studies. SSM - Population Health, 18, 101075. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ssmph.2022.101075
Lund, C., De Silva, M., Plagerson, S., Cooper, S., Chisholm, D., Das, J., Knapp, M., & Patel, V. (2011). Poverty and mental disorders: Breaking the cycle in low-income and middle-income countries. The Lancet, 378(9801), 1502-1514. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(11)60754-X
Martino, E., Li, Y., Kali-Opio, J., & Bentley, R. (2022). Between liminality and a new life in Australia: What is the effect of precarious housing on the mental health of humanitarian migrants? Cities, 131, 103900. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cities.2022.103900
Mukwege, D., & Berg, M. (2016). A Holistic, Person-Centred Care Model for Victims of Sexual Violence in Democratic Republic of Congo: The Panzi Hospital One-Stop Centre Model of Care. PLoS Medicine, 13(10), 1–9. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pmed.1002156
Patel, N. (2019). Conceptualising rehabilitation as reparation for torture survivors: a clinical perspective. The International Journal of Human Rights, 23(9), 1546–1568. https://doi.org/10.1080/13642987.2019.1612373
Patel, N., Kellezi, B., & Williams, A. C. de C. (2014). Psychological, social and welfare interventions for psychological health and well-being of torture survivors. Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, 2014(11), Article CD009317. https://doi.org/10.1002/14651858.CD009317.pub2
Renzaho, A. M. N., Doh, D., Mahumud, R. A., et al. (2020). The impact of the livelihoods and income fortification and socio-civic transformation project on the quality of life, wellbeing, self-esteem, and quality of neighbourhood social environment among the youth in slum areas in Kampala, Uganda. BMC Public Health, 20(1), 1872. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12889-020-09868-y
Ridley, M., Rao, G., Schilbach, F., & Patel, V. (2020). Poverty, depression, and anxiety: Causal evidence and mechanisms. Science, 370(6522), eaay0214. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aay0214
Schininá, G., Babcock, E., Nadelman, R., Walsh, J. M., Willhoite, A., & Willman, A. (2016). The integration of livelihood support and mental health and psychosocial wellbeing for populations who have been subject to severe stressors. Intervention, 14(3), 211-222.
Thorne, A. (2020). The potential for skills development programmes to empower poverty-affected and refugee women in rural Jordan. Journal of Vocational Education & Training, 73(4), 526–542. https://doi.org/10.1080/13636820.2020.1744691
Veronese, G., Cavazzoni, F., Vigliaroni, M., et al. (2022). Human insecurity and mental health among young Nigerien IDPs: A qualitative exploration of the role of quality of life as a risk and protective factor. Journal of Human Rights and Social Work, 7(1), 46-58. https://doi.org/10.1007/s41134-021-00207-8
Walther, L., Fuchs, L. M., Schupp, J., & von Scheve, C. (2020). Living conditions and the mental health and well-being of refugees: Evidence from a large-scale German survey. Journal of Immigrant and Minority Health, 22(5), 903–913. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10903-019-00968-5
Zaneva, M., Guzman-Holst, C., Reeves, A., & Bowes, L. (2022). The impact of monetary poverty alleviation programs on children's and adolescents' mental health: A systematic review and meta-analysis across low-, middle-, and high-income countries. The Journal of Adolescent Health: Official Publication of the Society for Adolescent Medicine, 71(2), 147–156. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jadohealth.2022.02.011
Ziersch, A., Miller, E., Walsh, M., Due, C., Callaghan, P., Howe, J., & Green, E. (2023). ‘I really want to work for me to feel good myself’: Health impacts of employment experiences for women from refugee backgrounds in Australia. SSM - Qualitative Research in Health, 3, 100209. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ssmqr.2022.100209
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2024 Torture Journal
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
We accept that some authors (e.g. government employees in some countries) are unable to transfer copyright. The Creative Commons Licence Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0) covers both the Torture Journal and the IRCT web site. The publisher will not put any limitation on the personal freedom of the author to use material contained in the paper in other works which may be published, provided that acknowledgement is made to the original place of publication.
