HAVEN FOR CHILDREN OF SYRIA
They were some of the youngest victims of the Syrian crisis, and were given sanctuary in Yorkshire. Mike Waites finds out how they are finally learning to deal with the horrors of war.
THE CITY of Bradford has a proud record of welcoming refugees dating back hundreds of years. Huguenots fleeing religious oppression in France in the 17th century, Jewish people including Kindertransport children escaping persecution in Europe and those displaced from former Nazioccupied countries are among those who have rebuilt their lives there.
Recent decades have seen new arrivals from the Middle East and Africa, and the latest to be given sanctuary are among the millions who have fled the conflict in Syria, now in its seventh year. Torn from ordinary lives, some have directly witnessed atrocities before escaping the fighting to spend sometimes years living in refugee camps.
Yet despite reaching the safety of the UK, the hidden scars of conflict inevitably remain. The vast majority of refugees in Bradford are directed for medical help to Bevan Healthcare, a specialist inner-city GP practice providing a range of care to some of the most disadvantaged groups in the city.
Staff are practised in dealing with displaced people but it soon became clear to them that children arriving from Syria – some of the most vulnerable and traumatised in the world – were struggling to deal with their often shattering experiences.
Realising they needed to act, they set out to develop a programme of specialist interventions for youngsters – even harnessing the natural splendours of the Yorkshire Dales – to give them an outlet to express their feelings and look ahead to the future.
Beth Kirby, monitoring and evaluation officer at Bevan Healthcare, said some youngsters had seen traumatic events and lost loved ones. Forced to flee their homes, they had lived for long periods in refugee camps which could also bring their share of bad memories. Here they had built relationships with others, including extended families, only to be moved on again to be resettled abroad, effectively suffering a double loss.
She said: “There are a lot of bereaved children who have lost fathers or siblings or other family members. Some have family remaining in Syria or in camps. When they get here, they face an identity crisis. They may be traumatised, they come to a new place they don’t really understand, they can’t understand the language, and don’t understand the school system.”
Those worst affected can be withdrawn, lonely, frightened to go to school, suffering mood swings, nightmares, flashbacks and difficulties sleeping. The intervention programme Sharing Stories, Building Hope is designed to make children more resilient, happier, increase their confidence and social skills, and improve their attendance and enjoyment of school.
One part has involved group psychotherapy for children to provide mental health support and interventions focused on dealing with trauma. Youngsters were asked make drawings of bad memories, producing some disturbing images which underline the scale of the trauma some had faced aged just six or seven.
“What came out a lot was the violence,” she said. “There were pictures of hospitals being bombed and guns being shot which was really traumatic to see so easily coming out of a child. Once they started, they couldn’t stop drawing – it was all wanting to come out. It was a chance for them to say what they wanted to say and get something off their chest.”
Helping the children with their drawings enabled staff to get to know them as individuals and about their families but it was also the start of a conversation to help them to deal with their memories.
The sessions were followed by a group trip to Clapham, near Settle, which she said had a “huge impact”, enabling them to see a link between the UK and Syria. “They had only experienced Bradford so when they got to Clapham and saw Ingleborough they wanted to ‘climb the mountain’, they saw sheep which reminded them of Syria and they talked about all the good things in Syria. The sense of home was lovely for them,” she said.
As part of the programme, children with more serious problems have oneto-one counselling. “It opened our eyes to it. When you look at the very honest behaviours and words of children, they leave nothing hidden,” she said.
Changes in youngsters following the work include increased confidence, improved socialising, smiling more and better attendance and enjoyment at school. Getting to know the children helped staff engage with their parents, who can also access trauma support.
She added: “They are all grateful for what’s being done for them here but they all want to go home when the war is over. I think life in Syria before the war was a good standard. The health and education system was a similar set up to any Western country so they are familiar with a kind of life that has been torn from them.”
Bradford is a City of Sanctuary and one of the northern hubs for receiving refugee families through four separate Home Office schemes. In total, around 300 refugees fleeing conflict and oppression are expected to arrive in the city each year for the next five years.
Bevan Healthcare has itself dealt with 650 in the last three years, among them unaccompanied children living in the so-called Calais Jungle. Its managing director Gina Rowlands said the programmes offered traumatised children an outlet.
“This has been a remarkable piece of work and has been a really humbling and uplifting experience for us,” she said. “Some of the children have been imprisoned, been witness to and victims of violence. They have seen atrocities – war crimes – in front of them and have also experienced being in refugee camps.
“It has required a huge amount of energy from everyone at Bevan and people have gone over and above. Bevan is seen as a safe place and a point of contact – often the only point of stability in people’s lives. We talk to families about wanting to help the children to flourish, support them to make friends, do well at school and to sleep well. Feedback from the schools has been really good. It’s not about attainment – it’s about being happy, settled and having friends.”
The health centre is named after the NHS founding father Aneurin Bevan and, for Beth Kirby, the programme is also a prime example of what the health service can do. In sentiments as relevant today as they were 70 years ago, she cites the words of Bevan in a speech to MPs on the day the NHS began its work in 1948: “We ought to take pride in the fact that, despite our financial and economic anxieties, we are still able to do the most civilised thing in the world – put the welfare of the sick in front of every other consideration.”
She said the work with the Syrian refugees had been a “massive learning curve”. “I think it’s a fantastic demonstration of what the NHS does, the way it responds to need and cares for all.”
There are a lot of bereaved children who have lost fathers or siblings or other family members. Some have family remaining in Syria. When they get here, they face an identity crisis. Beth Kirby of Bevan Healthcare on how the scars of child refugees run deep.