联合国儿童基金会强调：乌克兰儿童面临毁灭性的心理健康危险

UNICEF highlights devastating mental health dangers for Ukraine’s children

——原载《联合国新闻》2022年5月6日——

<UN News> May 6,2022

联合国儿童基金会欧洲和中亚地区儿童保护顾问亚伦格林伯格说：“我们预计，针对儿童的各种形式的暴力行为肯定会达到数万人。

深陷困境

2月24日战争爆发之前，乌克兰的孤儿院、寄宿学校和其他青少年机构收容了 91,000 多名儿童，其中约有一半是残疾儿童。

根据联合国儿童基金会（UNICEF）的数据，今天，只有大约三分之一的人返回家园，包括从东部和南部撤离的人。

“战争对这些孩子的影响尤其具有破坏性，”格林伯格先生在日内瓦通过来自利沃夫的 Zoom 对记者说。“随着战争的开始，成千上万生活在机构或寄养机构中的儿童已被送回家庭，其中许多是仓促的。许多人没有得到他们需要的照顾和保护，尤其是残疾儿童。”

复原

联合国机构谴责已经有数百名年轻人在炮击中丧生的事实，警告说其他人遭受了严重的心理健康创伤，这与身体和性暴力的“直接经历”有关。

格林伯格先生坚持认为，如果许多孩子能够重返学校并开始在生活中看到某种形式的“正常化”，他们就会“复原”，但他坚持认为，确保乌克兰的社会服务人员得到放心比以往任何时候都更加重要并鼓励留下来提供帮助。 

他还指出，“一个较小但重要的数字”可能会在他们受到创伤后的两到四个月内患上创伤后应激障碍。

“自2月24日以来，联合国儿童基金会和我们的合作伙伴已经为超过140,000 名儿童及其照顾者提供了心理健康和心理社会服务，”他继续说道。“但其中绝大多数（95%）是与儿童和训练有素的心理学家的直接接触。”

在整个乌克兰，儿基会部署了56个流动单位，为受创伤的儿童提供专门的健康服务。在战斗仍在进行的东部，还有12个“专门暴力问题机动队”。

“We’re anticipating numbers in terms of all forms of violence against children to be in the tens of thousands for sure,” said Aaron Greenberg, UNICEF’s regional child protection advisor for Europe & Central Asia.

Plight of thousands

Before24 February, Ukraine’s orphanages, boarding schools and other institutions for youngsters, housed more than 91,000 children, around half with disabilities.

Today, only around one-third of that number have returned home, including those evacuated from the east and south, according to UN Children’s Fund UNICEF.

“The impact of the war on these children has been particularly devastating,” said Mr. Greenberg, speaking to journalists in Geneva via Zoom from Lviv. “Tens of thousands of children living in institutional or foster care have been returned to families, many of them hastily, as the war got started. Many have not received the care and protection they require, especially children with disabilities.”

‘Bouncing back’ 

   Condemning the fact that hundreds of youngsters have been killed in shelling attacks already, the UN agency warned that others had suffered serious mental health trauma linked to “direct experience” of violence, both physical and sexual.

      While insisting that many children “will bounce back” if they can get back to school and start seeing some form of “normalisation” in their lives, Mr. Greenberg    insisted that it was more important than ever to ensure that Ukraine’s social service workforce was reassured and encouraged to stay and help.

He noted too that “a smaller, but important number” would likely develop post-traumatic stress disorder between two and four months after they were traumatized.

   “Since 24 February UNICEF and our partners have reached over 140,000children and their caregivers with mental health and psychosocial services,” he continued. “But a vast majority of that, 95 per cent, are direct engagements with children and trained psychologists.”