Apartheid as a Public Mental Health Issue

The most serious hazard to the physical and mental health of the majority rural poor black population in South Africa is caused by the ruling wealthy white minority's policy of apartheid. Forced removals and dumping of millions of people into small, disconnected, barren, poor reserve areas, bereft of adequate medical, psychiatric and public health services (the ‘final solution’ of the ‘native problem’) causes widespread malnutrition, infectious and other diseases, and high mortality and mental-illness rates. Blacks and progressive whites are banned, terrorized, detained without trial, tortured, and murdered by the state; the Africans are not only disfranchised but are now also being denationalized and deprived of their ancient birthright to this richly-endowed part of Africa. Acceptance of this modern version of Naziism by the World Psychiatric Association and the World Medical Association, in the face of adequate information provided by the United Nations, its agency the World Health Organization, the American Psychiatric Association, and numerous other agencies and reports, needs urgent examination and decisive action.