Mental Health Dept urges people to refrain from drinking alcohol during Buddhist Lent
The Department of Mental Health stated that alcoholics are patients, because alcoholic addiction leads to dementia and other problems in mental health.
Mental Health Department Director General Boonruang Trairuengworawat said that the Mental Health Department conducted the national mental health survey every five years to study the link between psychiatric disorders and substance abuse. The recent survey was conducted on nearly 5,000 subjects aged above 18 across Thailand during July and September of 2013.
The survey found that at 1.9 percent of the country’s population, or 1 million people in the country, suffer from mental problems.
In this group, 1.8 percent or 900,000 people suffer from depression while 1.6 million people suffer from anxiety. Around 500,000 adults are diagnosed with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).
The survey’s alarming discovery, is the fact that the prevalence of alcohol drinkers with mental issues is as high as 18 percent of the total population, or about 9.3 million people.
Alcohol can contribute to the development of mental health problems, as well as exacerbating pre-existing ones. It can cause an individual to act on suicidal thoughts, which they would not have done if not under the influence of alcohol.
He said that alcohol would lead to negative effects on the drinkers, their family, community, society, and the country as a whole.
The general public are urged to reduce, refrain, or quit drinking alcoholic beverages, as well as protecting the youth and the country’s children from succumbing to alcohol consumption.
Source: Thai Visa
