Sunday, May 15, 2011

Ugandans with Mental Illness Learn to Fit In

This story reported by Joanne Silberner and funded by a Rosalynn Carter Fellowship for Mental Health Journalism describes a program for helping people in Uganda with mental illness find employment. In a market economy, community acceptance is based on the ability to work and bring money home to the family. This story focuses on community efforts in Africa to supplement psychiatric treatment with vocational programs. The emphasis of this story is on how programs that promote work for the mentally ill are especially important in African communities. The suggestion seems to be that things are different in the United States.  In my experience, however, all that seems different in this country is that vocational programs for the mentally ill have a very low priority. Would that there were more effective programs promoting work for the mentally ill in the United States.