Mental Health Services: Asylum
(asked on 24th February 2025) - View Source
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to help tackle (a) trauma-related mental health issues among asylum seekers fleeing conflict and (b) generational trauma within those communities.
Recognising that asylum seekers may require additional mental health support including for trauma related mental health issues, the Department of Health and Social Care works together with NHS England and the Home Office to provide additional guidance and support where required.
The Mental Health Sub-Group of the National Asylum Seekers’ Health Oversight Group, which is co-chaired by the Home Office and NHS England, has published examples of national and local interventions aimed at maintaining and improving the emotional wellbeing and mental health of individuals seeking asylum. These are available at the following link:
Work is currently ongoing to review and improve the Solace training, designed to provide a foundational understanding of the mental health issues that people face in the context of seeking protection in the United Kingdom, so that it can be endorsed by NHS England and placed on the NHS Learning Hub. This will allow the training to be widely promoted to practitioners to understand better trauma and improve access, experience and outcomes of service.
In parallel, NHS England, the Department of Health and Social Care, the UK Health Security Agency and the Home Office have been working on practical ways to re-establish an improved initial health check within a few days from arrival to the UK. This early health check will include a baselining of physical and mental health needs and identify vulnerabilities. It reflects the recommendations of the British Red Cross’s report, Delivering with dignity, published in August 2024, and is cognisant of recommendation 16 in the recent report by the Commission on the Integration of Refugees.