The Taliban’s act of expelling women from universities and NGOs has caused a great uproar at the international level and has not stopped yet. According to the latest report coming out of Afghanistan, the figures show that the mental health of the country’s people is deteriorating and the number of people with mental illness is increasing suddenly.
Naturally, the extremely anti-feminist and anti-democratic policies and attitudes of the Taliban regime there point directly to this mental health index.
It is reported that people’s mental health problems are on the rise in Afghanistan in recent months. The amazing fact is that 80 percent of the increase in the number of mental patients are women.
Afghan media Tolo News reports that out of 100 people who regularly seek treatment in mental hospitals, 80 of them are women.
According to figures, at least 400 psychiatric patients were admitted to the provincial hospital in Herat last month alone.
Unemployment, family problems, closing schools and colleges and denying access to girls, including universities, are the main reasons for the increase in mental health problems, according to the Tolo News report.
The report also referred to domestic violence, marital problems and financial problems as contributing factors to mental illness.
Doctors in Herat province warn that if the country’s situation continues like this, the number of mentally ill patients will increase sharply.
Doctors also say that the situation of not being able to go out to get an education or work seriously affects the mental health of women in Afghanistan.
“Women make up half of the community. “It will be very good for their mental health if they go back to work and education,” said Dr. Muhammad Shafiq Omar said.
Women face serious problems under Taliban rule in the country. After taking over the Afghan government in August 2021, the Taliban implemented extreme anti-women measures. Schools and colleges had separate classrooms for boys and girls.
Women were denied access to parks, leisure centers and gyms, and measures such as pay cuts were taken to drive women out of government jobs.
In recent months, the Taliban have also issued orders to wear a burqa when leaving home and to travel only with a male relative.
More recently, the Taliban government has denied women access to universities and high schools and ordered all local and foreign NGOs in the country to send their female workers back home.
Last December 24, the Taliban issued an order banning women from working in NGOs. The United Nations, various countries and human rights organizations have protested against the ban on access to universities and the ban on NGOs.
But the Taliban have not yet felt that these criticisms or the ongoing discussions at international level have changed their policies and positions. They are even more undemocratic than when they first seized power in Afghanistan in 1996.
Content Highlights: Report says cases of mental illness are on the rise in Afghanistan, highest among women
