KUALA LUMPUR, Dec 10 — The Health Ministry (MOH) is focusing on conducting comprehensive engagement sessions with stakeholders, including non-governmental organisations (NGOs), to raise public awareness regarding mental health among children and adolescents.
Deputy Health Minister Datuk Lukanisman Awang Sauni said there is still stigma from parents who cannot accept that their child is identified as having mental health issues.
"During counselling, teachers find that some children, especially in primary schools, have mental health issues and societal stigma, as well as parents' inability to accept sending their children for screening and treatment at health facilities," he said during the question-and-answer session in the Dewan Rakyat today.
Lukanisman was responding to Bandar Tun Razak MP Datuk Seri Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail’s query on the effectiveness of measures through the National Security Policy 2021-2025 concerning a report that recorded 424,000 children, aged five to nine years, in Malaysia have been confirmed to have mental health issues.
Through information and experience-sharing sessions, he said Malaysia has good mental health programmes and modules that are praised by foreign countries, but the process to strengthen understanding among the community regarding this matter is still lacking.
Therefore, Lukanisman suggested that MPs organise programmes to enhance understanding of mental health in their respective constituencies.
At the same time, the MOH also aims to establish 30 child and adolescent psychiatry specialists by 2027, and so far the country has 18 such specialists serving in MOH hospitals.
— Bernama
