Pakistan’s population continues to grow rapidly unabated. The country’s population has already crossed 220 million. Despite this enormously increasing population, the country has one of the poorest mental health indicators as only less than 500 psychologists and psychiatrists are there for the entire population. This paucity of mental health professionals has created a narrow treatment gap leaving as high as more than 90 percent of the people with common mental health diseases are left without any treatment.
Psychological problems in the country are pretty widespread. A wider range of psychiatric mental health disorders are generally reported as depression, substance and alcohol use, schizophrenia, bipolar disorder and post-traumatic stress disorder. A large number of about 36 percent of the population suffers from anxiety and depression which is often caused by strained family and friendship relations, feelings of being unfit in society, the country’s unstable economic and political conditions giving rise to unemployment and poverty.
Ever-increasing prices of essential daily use items also contribute a great deal to mental health ailments particularly among people in the low income group in addition to unemployment and poverty.
As the population continues to grow, economic and health problems are also increasing alarmingly and more people of all genders and ages are committing suicides for varying reasons and factors in both rural and urban areas.
The suicide of a senior police officer in Rawalpindi, self-immolation by an unemployed man in Karachi, suicide by a man in Faisalabad two days after marriage and suicide by a young girl in Badin because of alleged social media blackmailing, amply show that vulnerability cuts through gender, social class and age groups in Pakistan.
If justice is provided to everyone then evil forces will be wiped out from society and no self-harm and suicidal tendencies will be seen. It is very important to work together, individually we are powerless and we cannot change society for better but when we join hands we become strong and can change the world.
According to the Pakistan Penal Code, suicide is a criminal act and all have to be reported to the police and evalluated at a medico-legal centre. However, families in majority of cases cover up suicides by reporting them merely as accidental deaths fearing harassment by the police or to avoid complicated legal procedure and also avoid social stigma after the loss of their loved ones.
The suicide rate among men is rerportedly two to three times higher than among women. It is feared that mental health illness will be among the leading causes of death by 2030.
While it is socially accepted to seek help from a health professional for physical ailments, seeking help for psychological disorders is somehow considered problematic. Families often hide mental illness cases to save the patient from adverse stereotyping.
More and more people are commiting suicide owing to increasing mental ailments everywhere in the country and the acute shortage of specialized health professionals is a matter of great concern and poses serious questions not only to the federal and provincial governments but civil society as a whole.
This situation underlines the dire need for more psychologists to provide necessary health consultations and required medical treatment for the maximum suffering from a disorder.
In view of reports about increasing suicides due to dufferent reasons and factors, there is also dire need need for conductig extensive studies to determine the factors which force people of all genders and ages to end their lives themselves somehow,.
Despite this discouraging backdrop, it is good to note that an appreciable number, particularly young women, are opting to study and specialize in clinical psychology for treating their fellow countrymen for mental health disorders and ailments.
ONe such young woman is Zunaira Qayyum whom this scribe came across recently and availed the opportunity to exchange views on matters of her deep interest and concern. At the very outset, she very emphatically stated that her childhood dream of becoming a successful young woman in the medical profession is half coming true as she is very close to achieving her cherished goal of becoming a clinical psychologist and the other half will hopefully be accomplished when she becomes well-known throughout Pakistan as an empathic listener to the mental health ailments sufferers who come to her for appropriate treatment of diseases.
For achieving her cherished goal of becoming a successful and popular clinical psychologist , Zunaira Qayyum is currently engaged in conducting extensive research work for her thesis titled “Self-Harm and Belongingness” at the University of Lahore under the able and expert advice of supervisor Zuhaib Hassan. As a good student, she duly appreciated very capable and emphatic teaching skills of her thesis supervisor, describing him as as a thoughtful teacher who brings out and polishes the hidden skills and capabilities of the students and is teaching her how to work and study at the highest level, for which she is very grateful.
Through the studies and research work for her thesis “Self-Harm & Belongingness” she is trying to explore and understand pertinent questions as to why do people harm themselves and often want to kill themselves, why are relationships so cold that no one has the power to heal these emotional wounds and why do we give stress to other persons instead of being a source of happiness to others ?
The second theme also of great interest and concern to her is justice. She wants yo work with those people who need justice because justice is very necessary to destroy the evil in society, and if justice is provided to everyone then evil forces will be wiped out from society and no self-harm and suicidal tendencies will be seen. She also strongly pleaded that as a community we should all help each other, it is very important to work together , individually we are powerless and we cannot change society for better but when we join hands we become strong and can change the world.
Zunaira Qayyum went on to say that she wants to become a leading psychologist starting private practice in Lahore, spending her life working for the kids and adults who have problems with their mental health telling everyone who comes to her to remember no matter how difficult life be, there is always hope and there is alway help. She keeps paying to Almighty Allah every day to give her courage to become a better person and a successful psychologist for the people who are suffering from any kind of illnesses.
She has received inspirations from her teachers and most importantly from the biggest name in Pakistan, Jimmy Engineer. She wants to become like him and concluded by emphatically saying, ” My life is only for Pakistan. All my heart, my spirit and my health is for the people of Pakistan and I promise to serve them faithfully and sincerely from now onwards as long as I am alive and breathing”.
