Webinar session on MH state in Gaza under Covid-19

Webinar session on MH state in Gaza under Covid-19

Gaza Community Mental Health Programme has organized a webinar on Thursday, July 16 to discuss the consequences of Covid-19 on the mental health state in the Gaza Strip.

More than 20 leading nongovernmental organizations, working in the field of psycho-social support, and representatives of the Ministry of Health and UNRWA participated in the online session.

The session was opened by Mr Qusai Abu Odei, GCMHP Director of External Relations and Resource Development Department. He explained the meeting agenda to the participants and main pivots of the discussion.

General Director, Dr Yasser Abu Jamei then presented a factsheet on 'the Impact of Coronavirus on mental Health in the Gaza Strip', which GCMHP had prepared recently. The factsheet provided information on the suicide cases and the nature of the response made towards this issue as well as its chronological development up to 2020 were also presented.

Dr Abu Jamei also explained during the session the susceptibility of the Gaza Strip and how the pandemic put more social and economic strains on the people and caused further mental health challenges.

On his part, Dr Sami Oweida, Director of Gaza Community Centre, talked about the impact of the economic challenges as well as other social factors of the mental health state of women and children, providing a set of recommendations on how to support them during this distressful situation.

The online session opened the space for the participating organizations to come with a set of recommendations to respond to what was described as a situation of a ‘crisis within a crisis’.