HEALTH-YUGOSLAVIA: Living Through a Trauma

By Vesna Peric Zimonjic Reprint | | Print |

Vesna Peric Zimonjic

BELGRADE, May 29 2000 (IPS) - Serbia is a country where a large sector of the population is suffering from post traumatic stress disorder, psychologists say.

Not surprising, they say, for a population who has lived through over a decade of war. There has certainly been nothing to smile about.

Since 1991, Serbs have been living a life that completely differs from anything they knew before.

They have seen the disintegration of a once prosperous six- member Yugoslav federation through two bloody wars in Croatia and Bosnia.

Whether supportive of the politics of Slobodan Milosevic or not, Serbs were collectively punished with several rounds of strict international sanctions against the country, that left the economy in ruins worse than the Second World War (1939-45) and German occupation.

On the top of it all, due to the regime’s repressive politics against ethnic Albanian minority in Kosovo, 7,5 million Serbs lived through 11 weeks of North Atlantic Treaty Organisation, NATO, air strikes last year.

They buried 2.000 dear ones and saw the destruction of industrial sites they worked at, infrastructure they used and homes they lived in.

The unbearable situation led to deep dissatisfaction with the regime among population and unprecedented turmoil in the deeply divided society, where many fear that civil war between the regime and its supporters and the rest of the population is a reality.

Leading psychologists and psychiatrists say that Serbs have fallen into visible apathy, which is only the tip of the iceberg of the overall depression among them. And depression, experts say, is not conducive to change or development.

“It’s very hard to say that our society is “sick”, but one can say that Serbia today has millions of psycho-traumatised people” Milan Popovic, professor of psychiatry at Belgrade University School of Medicine told IPS.

“We are under constant stress for 10 years now, but we had an acute stress recently – NATO air raids. There is no way that such a situation could leave peoples’ minds untouched. The visible apathy among people is only the tip of the iceberg – overall depression among Serbs” he added.

According to the statistics of medical experts, who attended a recent round table “Agony of Health Care System in Serbia,” the number of registered cases of depression in Belgrade has risen by 40 percent in the last 10 years.

For one registered case, there are at least four unregistered ones experts say. The round table was organised by city authorities of Belgrade, capital of Serbia, where almost a third of Serbian population live.

The most popular medicine among Serbs is ‘Bensedine’, an easily obtainable, domestic tranquiliser, experts at the round table said. More than three million tablets of ‘Bensedine’ are consumed daily, statistics of largest pharmaceutical factory Galenika say.

“A 10 year long stress has resulted in a state of total, chronic exhaustion,” Vuk Stambolovic, a specialist in social medicine told IPS.

“During the 10 years, stress among Serbs was accompanied with precipitating living standards and malnutrition among impoverished population.

“A constant feeling of worry, expressed in the question: ‘What is the next bad thing that is going to hit me and my family’ has become a thing people wake up regularly with,” he adds.

According to a recent study by the Belgrade Philosophy Faculty, more than 50 percent of Serbians live in a state of constant worry and constant bad mood. “It seems to be a vicious circle”, the study said.

“People constantly worry that things might get worse – like a civil war could break out or there will not be enough food in Serbia. This adds to their already worrisome thoughts and their mood becomes worse. The vicious circle does not seem to have a chance to end,” the study concluded.

“The situation is the worst among those groups of population that depend on others – children, adolescents, pregnant women, mothers with small children, elders, refugees,” Milan Popovic says.

Serbia hosts almost one million refugees – Serbs who fled Croatia, Bosnia and Kosovo province. Those people are in a hopeless situation, Popovic says.

“Many have lost their loved ones, their property, everything. Their mental health has not been researched yet, but one can say it is very dark”.

Experts are not very willing to comment the link between apathy or depression with the possible outcome of turmoil in the country, where anti-regime protests are frequent, but opposition parties seem to lack strength to move people.

“People have lost hope” Milan Popovic says. “In the past, during the last 10 years, many have invested their strength into in anti-regime protests that were aimed at changes in this country, but nothing happened. That is also another thing that pushed them into apathy”, Popovic explains.

Anti-Milosevic protests were held in Serbia in 1991, 1992, 1993 and for four months, in November 1996 to March 1997 period. Mass anti-regime protests were also held in the summer of 1999, after NATO air strikes ended, but slowly died out.

Jovan Maric, another prominent professor of psychiatry in Belgrade says any collective moves for the improvement of the situation are hardly likely with an apathic population that is now facing fear too.

“The wave of mass arrests of popular Otpor (Resistance) symphatisers and propaganda war of the regime that brands as “terrorists” all who oppose it have taken their toll,” Maric told IPS. “Induced fear is another weapon (of the regime) that will make people bow their heads.”

According to Maric, the endangered mental health of the Serb nation leaves fertile ground for manipulation, mostly by the regime-controlled media.

“That is the only way to explain and to understand how the official propaganda can still insist on the fact that it has won the war against NATO and kept Kosovo within Serbia.”

In reality, Kosovo is run by the UN administration since last June, while all the Serb security forces and more than 200.000 strong Serb population have left the province.