exacerbates Egypt’s inability to provide the mental health services necessary.
Meanwhile, family members treat mental illness as something shameful to be hidden away.
“If someone suffers from a psychiatric disorder and they go to hospital, the expectation is that they get treated and come out again,” said Dr Nasser Loza, director of the private Behman Psychiatric Hospital and chair of the Egyptian Society for the Rights of People with Mental Illness.
“But there seems to be a growing culture that people wouldn’t mind keeping their son or daughter in hospital forever … and that’s quite a task in a country of 100 million,” said Dr Loza, who has been a psychiatrist for more than 25 years and previously worked for the government as secretary general for mental health.
COVID-19 places a heightened emphasis on mental health
Companies must focus on the social factors that can influence employee performance.
Photograph by Prostock-Studio
The COVID-19 crisis forced organizations worldwide to make immediate decisions about how to protect their employees from a mysterious, fast-spreading, sometimes deadly pathogen. Among their actions were requiring employees and customers alike to wear face coverings, deploying testing, adopting best hygiene practices, rolling out health monitoring and reporting apps, and encouraging people to work from home. In short, businesses quickly acted on the social determinants of health by adapting policies and physical environments to protect employee and customer well-being.