Mental health services urgently needed in Canterbury, BOP - therapist Jean Bell
A Whakatāne therapist says the Whakaari eruption and Christchurch mosque shooting reveal a health system unable to deal with mass casualty events.
This comes amid calls for millions of dollars of promised mental health funding to be urgently re-routed to Canterbury and the Bay of Plenty.
Irene Begg, a trauma counsellor based near Whakatāne, was involved in the mental health response to the Whakaari eruption and the Christchurch mosque shooting.
She said the same problems of people suffering from vicarious trauma, struggling access to access funded mental health support, have cropped up in both tragedies, while hospital workers and emergency service staff could access counselling through their employer.