By Daniel Itai
International civic organization, Human Rights Watch (HRW), has called out against the shackling of people with psychosocial disorders.
In a damning report compiled by HRW’s Disability Rights Division Senior Research and Report Author, Kriti Sharma, the shackling of people with psychosocial disorders is still prevalent in more than 60 countries.
“People with psychosocial disorders are being treated with absolute brutality across the world they are forced to stay in a tiny room, shackled and forced to fast.
Many families don’t understand the issue of psychosocial disorder because they think it’s a curse or they got bewitched so we need to combat this stigma.
We documented the reason for shackling in all aspects so poverty, fear, stigma are amongst the reasons why they get to shackle them but it’s really abhorrent one man in Ghana was shacked to a tree for five years,” said Sharma.
Sharma further highlighted that there was need for government to intervene now more than ever to combat the shackling of people with psychosocial disorders.
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“The next step is advocacy with government and creating some form of assistance as well as banning this manner of shackling people. This simply can’t continue, it’s torture.
Moreover, shackling is really traumatising it causes things like cardio vascular issues and post-traumatic stress disorder. It’s really important for governments to include people with psychosocial disorders. It’s time for us to break the chains of stigma,” said Sharma.
@danielItai_zw
