Showing a sensitive face towards the children who lost their parents to COVID-19, the state government has decided to provide trauma-informed counseling to these orphaned children.
Director, Women and Child Development, Manoj Rai, said that there was a grave need, now more than ever, to stand with affected children throughout their lives so that they could lead a quality life and get over their plight.
The Uttar Pradesh Mukhya Mantri Bal Sewa Yojana was started in June 2021, keeping in mind the mental health of the children who lost either one parent or both parents to COVID-19. The government decided to reach out to them and help them overcome their grief, deep anguish and distress through trauma-informed therapy.
More than 11,000 such children have been identified under the scheme.
“With the support of UNICEF and Mind Piper (mental health services provider), four counselors from the DCPU (District Child Protection Unit) and One Stop centres, were trained in each district to identify the trauma cases and help them overcome the grief and post-traumatic stress disorder. In total, over 300 counselors were trained for the purpose across the 75 districts,” Rai said.
After the training, these counselors went to the houses of these children and provided them trauma-informed counseling.
“In the month of May, analysis and field visits were conducted during which it was noticed that some children were highly traumatised. To provide counseling to these children, specialised training is being given to 40 counselors who are now helping these children,” Rai said.
Trauma-informed counseling is a special care treatment in which the trained counselors engage with a depressed person in a manner that allows for implementation of an effective treatment process through tailored interventions which leave no scope of re-traumatisation in the individual.