Durban - South Africans are burdened by “a toxic mess of mental health” as they face a tsunami of crises which threatens to overwhelm them.
Employers of debt-ridden South Africans struggling with anxiety, depression and sleeping disorders are also feeling the strain with an increase in absenteeism and “presenteeism”, people who are at work but unable to focus on work.
The South African Depression and Anxiety Group (Sadag) said the psychosocial impact of financial stress had a bearing on every aspect of a person’s life.
Sadag operations director Cassey Chambers, said it wasn’t just losing your job but also the effort of holding onto it which caused mental stress, anxiety, depression and burnout. “All of these things are not things that have office hours, it’s not something that you can switch off, it’s part of every aspect of your life.”
She said sometimes people took their problems from home to work, or from work to home, leaving them burnt out and struggling to find the passion, drive or motivation to work. Some of those who reached out for help were even contemplating suicide as they battled to find solutions to their problems.
Currently, Sadag gets between 2 500 and 3 000 calls a day, and hundreds more emails, SMSes and WhatsApps daily, with many of the callers sharing their financial stress and strain.
Cassey said it was difficult to put a figure to the number of people considering suicide because it fluctuated.
“But we can say that financial issues such as debt, unemployment, high cost of living, etc are major contributing factors for our callers from across the country.”
The SA Foundation for Mental Health reported that according to the Global Health Estimates report, South Africa had the third-highest suicide rate of all African countries, at 23.5 per 100 000 population. It said suicide, suicide attempts, suicidal ideation and self-harm were public health concerns.
Clinical psychologist Suntosh Pillay, said the impact on the workplace was not surprising because economic circumstances and mental health were intertwined, even more so in South Africa which, according to the Gini coefficient (a measure of income inequality), was officially the most unequal country in the world.
“So on the one hand, you’ve got a kind of rampant inequality that already has always been affecting South Africans’ mental health, then when you add on top of that the increasing cost of living, rising inflation, the repo rate going up, very slow economic growth, and a general sense of almost hopelessness, I think, in the current political system, then it's quite a toxic mix for mental health.”
Pillay said without access to jobs there wasn’t access to sustainable livelihood.
“Jobs are also linked to having meaning and purpose in life, a sense of initiative to get up in the morning, a feeling that you are providing for yourself and your loved ones, and that you are a productive member of society,” he said.
Pillay who works in the public sector, said in the current economic climate South Africans felt less and less empowered in a psychological sense, and if there was an improvement in the economic circumstances of the country, it would also improve the collective psychological empowerment of the country.
“At the psychological level, it can be feelings of hopelessness, of being disempowered, or low self esteem and low self confidence. At the more psychiatric level, it can result in mental illness, such as depression, anxiety, trauma. People actually become quite traumatised by an economic system that is what we would call structurally violent towards them. And it can manifest in many other ways as well, in terms of violence, because we know that when people are unable to have full psychological growth, it can result in frustration, irritability, and anger.”
He said often people who were closest to those under pressure suffered the most as economic and financial issues at a national level filtered all the way down to what really happened in people's homes. “So I think it's not a coincidence that we have some of the highest rates of rape, murder and gender-based violence in the world,” said Pillay.
National Debt Advisors quality insurer Quinton Ramohlabi, said lack of concentration, absenteeism and decreased employee morale were just some of the issues employers had to find ways of managing. The financial problems affected them negatively because they were unable to perform their duties; they couldn’t concentrate or collaborate with co-workers, and it affected their overall productivity.
“It brings a lot of stress to the employees because now they are thinking about their debt, they are thinking of receiving calls from debt collectors instead of thinking of their daily duties, so it takes 100% of their attention and they are invested in having stress, and are not able to cope.”
He said some of the people who approached National Debt Advisors for help reported that debt collectors called them up to 30 times a day demanding to know when they would settle their accounts.
“Their money problems have a knock-on effect on their mental wellness and they just can’t cope. All they can think about is their debt and when they will get a call again. It takes a huge toll on workers and has a major impact on their functioning,” Ramohlabi said, adding that burdened workers also affected the productivity of their colleagues who had to wait for responses to emails, feedback on projects, recommendations or cooperation which resulted in missed deadlines.
Ramohlabi said the company received thousands of calls for help and employers could support their staff by educating them on financial wellness and literacy.
Sadag’s Chambers said it was important for people to know that others were going through similar situations.
“Sometimes it can feel very lonely and isolating, and talking to someone else and saying this is what I am going through and just feeling less alone can be incredibly helpful,” she said.
Chambers said Sadag was available 24 hours a day for free telephone counselling on 0800 456 789; it also had free resources or referrals for those in need. Apart from discussing ways to work through economic problems,Sadag counsellors could help callers with information about medical aids and the various benefits available for those who were overwhelmed. They could also connect with the organisation through their various social media platforms like Facebook.
Pillay said improving mental health was not just about improving access to healthcare services but about creating economic growth in the country. Mental health was not only the responsibility of healthcare workers, it was the job of politicians and policymakers and people in charge of growing the country’s economy, he said.
“Because having access to a stable income, and having access to a good free market where there’s opportunities for entrepreneurship, and ensuring that your monthly payments on things like cars and houses are not rapidly increasing, all of these things are linked to good mental health. So it’s so important that we think of these larger issues of economics and finance in the country as being directly related to mental health.”
The Independent on Saturday