Over the last decade many social and community centres have been created or expanded in response to Greece’s economic crisis. Today unemployment in the country remains at 25%, rising to over 50% among young people. Meanwhile as a result of austerity measures, pensions have been halved, and salaries in state jobs have been cut by 40%. Then on top of it all there is the infamous refugee crisis. [...]
Babel’s individual approach towards each newcomer creates trust. “This is what they have most lacked”, Janis continues. Nonetheless, he explains, it is difficult to establish this kind of relationship, as many refugees have never experienced psychological and psychiatric assistance before. In Babel, they try to go beyond the idea of refugees as a weak group of endangered people, unable to act and make decisions by themselves. [...]
The situation in Germany is a useful point of contrast. Mental health care through psychotherapy aimed at the control of PTSD (stress, anxiety, depressions and traumas) is an important part of integration activities there. Greece, on the other hand, suffers from a lack of professionals, and for this reason, an increasing number of pilot programmes aim to educate the refugees as equivalent psycho-social consultants who can help other asylum seekers or persons granted asylum though group therapy. “The problem is that most of them live in isolation in camps, out of society, so they hardly ever meet local people,” says Janis. [...]
It might sound surprising but in the experts’ opinion it is single men who are the most endangered group, as organizations and community centres pay the least attention to them. These are considered people who are not affected by such problems, or who can solve them on their own.
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