Researchers, practitioners and activists at a discussion on Friday said that investment in mental healthcare remained neglected over the years in the county in comparison with physical healthcare.
Investment is neglected in this important healthcare sector but adequate investment in the sector can reduce incidents of suicide that have been increasing in the country, they said at the event organised by Kaan Pete Roi and Sajida Foundation in the capital鈥檚 Brac Centre Inn.
Sajida Foundation executive director Zahida Fizza Kabir said that mental health was not on the lists of the international organisations.
She said that organisations working in the mental health sector were facing funding crisis that hampered their activities.
State minister for women and children affairs Simeen Hussain Rimi said that in many cases families hid mental health problems of their members and did not visit doctors.
In villagers, the suicide rate is high because of prevailing social taboo about mental health which most of the people treat as mad, she added.
Kaan Pete Roi, a voluntary platform for emotional support, reported that it daily received average 40 calls.
In the past 11 years the platform has received 55,000 phone calls, it said, adding that 25 per cent of the callers are those having suicidal tendencies.
Founder of the organisation Yeshim Iqbal demanded more public awareness to prevent suicidal deaths in the country.
Fiction writer Muhammad Zafar Iqbal, Directorate General of Health Services鈥� line director for Non-communicable diseases Md Robed Amin spoke, among others, at the event.
