Children self harm six months after Sichuan earthquake
Transcript of radio report from Radio Australia, ABC
November 11, 2008
Six months after China’s Sichuan Province was devastated by a massive earthquake aid organisations say they are still very much needed to help the reconstruction. The quake killed 70,000 people, left five million homeless and over 8,000 children orphaned. Among the most tragic outcomes are the instances of self-harm by children disturbed by their experiences.
Presenter: Karon Snowdon
Speaker: Francis Marcus, International Red Cross Federation and Red Crescent Society
FRANCIS MARKUS: Right now I’m speaking to you from a place called Shifang in Sichuan and we’re actually in a school which was badly affected by the earthquake. It’s a small school by Chinese standards – about 300-plus pupils, of which 80 were killed in the disaster. And in this school the Red Cross is doing a two-day program here of psychosocial work – in which they have psychologists working not just with the children but also with the teachers. Lots of people are quite emotionally disturbed, as you might expect.
KARON SNOWDON: And given that children did suffer so much in the earthquake, what sort of psychological problems are still prevalent six months on?
FRANCIS MARKUS: Well, the teachers have been telling us that quite a lot of the children are still in a state of somewhat being emotionally disturbed and stirred up by the disaster. Some children have injured themselves. It’s very difficult for the children to communicate with the teachers and the teachers are quite bewildered by a lot of this. And also, the students have lost their focus on their studies and parents are no longer pushing the children to study – as Chinese parents so often do – because they’re concerned overwhelmingly only with their children’s safety and the fact that their children are healthy. So there have been all sorts of shifts in the communities and the psychosocial work is aimed at really trying to help these communities regain their resilience and a sense of balance.
KARON SNOWDON: And are many people still living outside of permanent buildings? How many homes have been rebuilt or not been rebuilt? What’s the physical situation like for people now?
FRANCIS MARKUS: You do see quite a lot of houses being rebuilt, but in percentage terms it’s maybe only 20% of the housing that’s being rebuilt, one might say, and most of it’s not finished, so hundreds of thousands at least are still living in temporary accommodation, prefabricated housing, and you do see – especially in the more rural areas – thousands of people still living in tents.
KARON SNOWDON: And winter is coming on there in China, so it can’t be too comfortable for people?
FRANCIS MARKUS: Families are starting to feel the cold. We in the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies have already procured 100,000 quilts but that’s far from enough. So we are now procuring as fast as we can an additional 200,000 to distribute.
KARON SNOWDON: So it would be fair to say that people are still under, or experiencing, quite a high level of hardship?
FRANCIS MARKUS: Yes, I mean, people here in these communities are extremely resilient but they are still facing a lot of difficulties in their daily lives and they are facing a lot of uncertainty as to how long it will take them to be able to rebuild their houses. We will be helping more than 17,000 families rebuild their homes and the Chinese Red Cross will be helping more than 30,000 families, but it is still a long and difficult process and we do need help from the international community to increase the number of families who we’re able to help.
KARON SNOWDON: And is unemployment still very high?
FRANCIS MARKUS: Well, employment is going to turn out to be an issue, that’s for sure. There’s no shortage of construction work, but a lot of the factories have been damaged and in addition we are starting to see the effects of the worldwide financial crisis and its affects on export orders affecting factories in the disaster areas.
KARON SNOWDON: Do you think – given the financial crisis and the slowdown within China – that the effort there may become defused, it may suffer because of the financial crisis elsewhere?
FRANCIS MARKUS: I’m confident that whatever difficulties we may face that we will not and should not, kind of, face, if you like, an attention deficit. These problems must remain to the fore and we must continue to focus attention on them.
Tags: balance, blanket, Chinese Red Cross, cold, emotionally disturbed, primary school, psychological, quilt, resilience, self harm, Shifang