The surge in violent crime and shooting deaths is having a traumatic effect on children, many of them living not just with the grief of the loss of a parent, but also fear that they will be next.
This is according to United Nations child rights expert Faith Marshall-Harris, who also manages the FMH Sandy Lane Charitable Trust Child Helpline.
She said people were reaching out to the helpline as Barbados continued to see an increase in violence and homicides.
“It is affecting many children, but boys, in particular, have been severely traumatised. These boys are losing fathers who have either been gunned down or because they have been imprisoned as perpetrators of those crimes. They are not only in grief mode but are also suffering a great deal of fear of retribution. Some of us may feel that this fear is irrational, but it is very real to them,” she told the DAILY NATION.
Noting that the helpline had been providing counselling for these children, mainly between the ages of 12 and 15 years, Marshall-Harris said: “I need to emphasise to adults that whatever we do, or fail to do, in our communities can have a shattering effect on children whose lives are turned upside down as they witness what happens to parents, to their friends, to parents of their friends, and what happens within their sight and hearing.”
She also made reference to children who witness violence in their communities, underscoring the fact that violence had become almost normal for some.
She said this had to be urgently addressed.
“We must be conscious that a climate of violence will last well beyond the present, as it will live on in the experiences of those who will take it into the
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Perpetrators ‘grew up around violence’
next generation. We are doing whatever we can to repair the damage, but this is like bolting the stable door after the horse has gone. We must work primarily on prevention.
“Of equal concern is that statistically, the majority of the perpetrators and the victims of the shooting deaths are young men, quite often barely out of the school room, mere children themselves.
“The statistics also indicate that these same young men have grown up in situations where they experience a lot of violence around them. It was their lived reality.
“All of the adults in children’s lives must understand the profound effect of their actions on impressionable children who will pay an enormous price as they navigate an uncertain future.”
When contacted, Dr Brian Maclachlan, senior consultant psychiatrist at the Psychiatric Hospital, echoed similar sentiments.
“There are main effects – the grief and sadness that come from the deaths of persons that these children would know who are either family, friends or family friends. The other effect is the anxiety that is caused by the fear of further shootings, and feeling unsafe and vulnerable if the shootings are literally close to home.
“Some of the children are also family or friends of the shooters, and this can produce its own set of grief,” he said.
Maclachlan said the Psychiatric Hospital and community mental health services “were available to intervene if there is acute mental health trauma arising from the witnessing or other effects as mentioned above about shootings” (MB)
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