Refleksi : Hidup neo-Mojopaghit! Dirgahayu NKRI! http://www.smh.com.au/world/the-face-of-indonesias-shame-20100618-ymuq.html
The face of Indonesia's shame TOM ALLARD JAKARTA June 19, 2010 In chains and desperate ... a patient at the Yayasan Galuh Centre in Bekasi, outside Jakarta. The centre's director says he and his staff have no medical training and use prayer and "ancient wisdom". Photo: Jason South TENS of thousands of mentally ill Indonesians bear an unimaginable torment, left to battle the demons of severe psychiatric disorders while chained and shackled for years on end. Confined by the length of their chain, the wooden stock in which they are trapped, or the makeshift cage in which they are imprisoned, they are forced to eat, sleep and defecate in the same spot while their illness goes untreated. The practice known as pasung - literally ''stocks'' - is common in Indonesia, and one the country's new director of mental health does not attempt to sugarcoat. ''It's terrible. It's a situation that should not happen. Not only in terms of psychiatric diseases, but in terms of humanity,'' says Irmansyah, who took up his post in February. ''We don't know the exact number [of pasung] but, if we scale up to an Indonesian level [after surveys in districts], it could reach more than 30,000.'' An investigation by the Herald has uncovered multiple examples of rank abuse of the mentally ill, including at facilities that receive funding by government agencies. At the Yayasan Galuh rehabilitation centre in Bekasi, more than one-third of the patients are chained up in a large shed bisected by two open sewers. All appear underfed, many are naked, the old mixed with the young. The newest patient was a 12-year-old named Santo, dropped off by the local police after he was found disoriented on the streets and unable to tell them where he lived. His screams as the chain twists around his leg reverberated around the building. The centre's director, Suhartono, admits he and his staff have no medical training and use prayer, massage and ''ancient wisdom'' as treatments. ''I never went to a school of psychology,'' Suhartono boasts. ''But I believe I could teach psychology students about treating these people.'' For many more of Indonesia's mentally ill subjected to pasung, their agony is a more isolated experience. In villages with no access to psychiatric services and families with no resources to pay for them anyway, the mentally ill are shackled near the home. ''Without access to basic care, it's often the only practical and safe solution [families] can resort to,'' explains Professor Chee Ng, a psychiatrist at the University of Melbourne, where a consortium of mental health bodies are helping Indonesian mental health practitioners. Mental health receives just 1 per cent of Indonesia's health budget, and almost all of it is devoted to expensive mental health hospitals. Dr Irmansyah, one of only 500 psychiatrists in Indonesia, wants to revamp the entire strategy, providing care through community health centres and eliminating pasung by 2014, a highly optimistic objective. ''We know we cannot do it ourselves. So we invite [non-government organisations] and other bodies outside our office to get involved in this program. We really appreciate Australian support.'' [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
