Mental health support for traumatized children

Sudan |2023| CBPF

Sudan, River Nile and Gedaraf.Children who have fled the fighting in Khartoum have experienced trauma and even after reaching a safer place, they need support to deal with what they have been through.

Since fighting began in April, about 5.25 million people have fled their homes, with an estimated 3.3 million children now living in displaced locations around Sudan. Hundreds have been killed in the conflict.

In River Nile state, Save the Children, with support from the Sudan Humanitarian Fund, is working alongside Sudanese organizations to deliver critical psychosocial care for children, including mental health care and access to child-friendly spaces.

Reem (not pictured), has been attending a mobile child-friendly space, where she can play with kids her age and, as appropriate, speak with a counsellor about what happened to her.

Maab Abdelmounim, a Save the Children psychologist working with displaced children in Gezira state, describes what children like Reem are going through: “The children talk. They tell us about what happened to them in Khartoum, what they saw on their journey…” One way to talk about what happened is through drawing. Maab describes another child, who, “on his first day here …drew a military vehicle and wrote ‘Sudan is in danger.’”

In Gedaraf, Plan International is also working to train social workers and volunteers on mental health first aid.

With the aim of mitigating the immediate effects of trauma, mental health – or psychological first aid – is a way to stabilize people who have experienced trauma, before they connect to further help and assistance.

Adapted from original stories from Save the Children and Plan International.

For more information: visit the Sudan Humanitarian Fund page; and find realtime contribution and allocation data on the POOLED FUNDS DATA HUB.