How can the BRAC para-counsellor initiative ensure good mental health for communities?
Thus, BRAC has taken two crucial initiatives. The first is the “humanitarian play lab model”. Working with Rohingya children in Cox’s Bazar, we identified a major problem: the children live lives marked by the trauma of the violence they experienced.
We had to take care of their mental health before we could focus on their education. This is why we launched this initiative as a pilot project, and discussions are currently underway to replicate our “Humanitarian Gaming Lab Model” in refugee camps around the world, as it may be applicable to refugee camps. refugees from all over the world.
The second initiative is the community-based “para-counsellor model.” With this intervention, we aim to reach people at risk of developing mental health disorders and offer them the opportunity to seek help from the first days.
It has been observed that we can nip mental health disorders in the bud if we can openly talk to someone about the things that are putting us under mental stress. Under this model, BRAC currently provides services with over eight hundred para-counsellors across the country.
Today, the Bangladesh government plans to use this model to bring mental health care to communities. Already, a memorandum of understanding (MoU) has been signed between BRAC and the Non-Communicable Disease Control (NCDC) program under the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS) in this regard.
