The SOS Children's Villages Association fights for Polish child psychiatry

Every month, 70 children in Poland try to take their own lives. In 2020, 107 minors did so successfully. Last week, tragic news circulated in the media about the double suicide of two thirteen-year-olds. The mental condition of Polish children after the pandemic is very bad, while only 482 child psychiatrists work in Poland, and the cost of a 45-minute private psychiatric consultation for a young person can be as high as PLN 400. On September 10, on the Suicide Prevention Day, the SOS Children's Villages Association will again appeal for improving access to psychological and psychiatric care for children throughout Poland.

Mental disorders of children and adolescents are diagnosed at an earlier and earlier stage of development, and their scale is constantly increasing. Approximately 630,000 children were requiring specialist support even before the pandemic. Therefore, in April 2021, SOS Children's Villages sent a petition to Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki, which was signed by over 8,000 people. In the petition, the Association called for decisive and systemic measures to increase access to multi-specialist mental health care for children and adolescents, especially in rural areas.

As emphasized by Agnieszka Brejwo, a therapist from the SOS Specialist Center in Kraśnik, the pilot of Community Health Centers has started, but unfortunately, it is a drop in the ocean of needs.

"Psychiatry in Poland is functioning very badly and this has been the case for a long time. In many locations, everything works the old way. A doctor visits the clinic twice a month, there are long lines of children and their parents awaiting. There is no such thing as we do in Kraśnik. Private consultations are expensive, and because of many people in need, the waiting time is long," Agnieszka Brejwo said.

(WBJ)