Thailand: Aiding Displaced Shan

The Shan are the largest ethnic minority group of those that reside in Burma. This ethnically diverse population of an estimated 6 million have been driven out of Burma by a number of forces including political oppression by the military government, dire financial conditions, lack and medical care and a plethora of human rights violations. Since their displacement they have faced a number of new challenges in their host country, Thailand.

The Shan have been denied official recognition as refugees, and thus are denied help by the international community who focus on refugee support and resettlement. Ironically, the name Shan comes from Thailand's former name, Siam, which means free. Given the treatment they have been enduring, the Shan people are far from realizing the meaning of their name. They are rejected and oppressed by their home country, disliked by their Thailand hosts, caught in a web of civil war, drugs, poverty and oppression, and noted to be the 9th largest un-reached people group in the world.

Unlike the Karen, another displaced Burmese group residing in and around Mai Sot, Thailand, there exist no official refugee camps along the Thai-Shan border for the Shan. Since they are not recognized as asylum seekers, and are not provided safe refuge and humanitarian assistance, they are forced to either live in hiding as illegal persons on the Thai-Burma border or seek work as migrant workers in low-paid, low-skilled, and often unsafe jobs. In addition to living a marginalized existence in Thailand, the Shan live in constant fear of being arrested and deported to Burma, where they would face ongoing persecution in the forms of torture, rape and death.

Presently the Shan desperately need safe refuge and humanitarian assistance, including basic health care, education and psycho-social support.

How SalusWorld Helps
Training, capacity building and treatment for the traumatized

The long-term vision of SalusWorld in Thailand and Burma is to simultaneously build awareness of trauma and mental health issues while training a corps of skilled mental health paraprofessionals that can serve as mental health counselors and advocates for human rights of all Burmese people. SalusWorld’s model is based on experiential training, and matching skilled psychologists and clinical social workers with local counselor trainees from the communities in which they serve.

The rational for the Fang Community Mental Health Initiative in Fang, Thailand, serving the mental health needs of the displaced Shan. The goal of the project is to create a sustainable community network to address the mental health needs of the Shan adults and children living and working in and around the Fang area.
Our partner health facility in Chiang Mai Province provides the much-needed medical care for these populations on the northern border between Thailand and Burma. However, the Shan have numerous mental health needs, the most striking of which is the prevalence of symptoms of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), exhibited by those living on the border. These populations do not have access to mental health treatment from any source, leaving their mental health needs festering undiagnosed and untreated. This ultimately results in an increase in problems at the individual, family and community levels.

Equally as devastating and of great concern is the recent influx and rise in the incidence of HIV/AIDS in these populations. Community health workers and other professionals who work with those coming from Burma are left with the overwhelming task of seeing these issues unfold but lacking the expertise to provide interventions or implement programs to address these significant mental health problems and alleviate the symptoms of PTSD. Through training and mentoring provided by psychologists and mental health professionals from SalusWorld, the project will build a sustained community based program to provide services for the diagnosis and treatment of the mental health problems faced by the Shan in Fang. SalusWorld’s training modules include training on a wide range of mental health topics including but not limited to: basic mental health, the identification and treatment of trauma, assessment skills, co-facilitating small group counseling, grief and loss, co-facilitating training in at least one mental health subject area and appropriate record keeping.