Ministry of Health hosts mental health workshop

The Ministry of Health today held a mental health workshop. The workshop held at the Belize Institute of Management was focused on the need for stakeholders to provide employment for persons with mental disabilities.  The two-day workshop is providing coaching and training to potential employers for the inclusion of mental health persons who have generally been left out of the workplace.  Eleanor Bennett of the Mental Health Unit spoke to News Five about the event.

Eleanor Bennett, Mental Health Unit, Ministry of Health

Eleanor Bennett

“The statistics will tell you that people with mental disabilities are among the group of people that are most unemployed or they suffer from quite a high rate of unemployment. And they face a lot of barriers: there can be personal barriers, there can be environmental, attitudinal barriers as it relates to them either finding work or going back to work after they have had a relapse. And often times, we find people, we hear their stories about when they go back to work, how the environment is so different and people treat them differently and that creates additional stress. So that’s just one of the things that contribute to them not being able to function well at work.  So what we are trying to do at the mental health program is to have supported employment as a part of the service we provide because it is very important for the recovery of a patient who has a mental health disorder. Competitive work is important not only for them to provide for themselves and their families, but also for them to improve their self-esteem, to help them to recover to the best or to the optimum, the best for them. And so we want to incorporate this service as a part of the service that we already provide. In many cases, people with mental health disorders, they are qualified, they can work. It might mean a little adjustment of the environment, but not a lot that it will make it difficult for others. But an employer has to, we would hope that they can look pass the diagnosis and then look at the qualifications of the person. In many cases, the people with the mental health disorder are qualified for the job, but because of the attitude, because of our own beliefs, they are not hired. For that reason, we have quite a number of people that are out of work. After a while, people with mental health disorders start to believe that they are less than because that’s what they have been told. You can’t work, you are week, people will think you are crazy…so all of these negative messages are fed to them and then after a while, they start to stigmatize themselves and they exclude themselves from society.”