The impact of war on Iraqi children

The Impact of War
Treating Iraqi Children For PTSD
by Lourdes Garcia-Navarro
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Morning Edition, August 25, 2008 · According to the Web site Iraq Body Count, at least 658 children were killed in Iraq in 2007, and the violence has touched the lives of many others. Iraq children have been the victims of kidnapping, torture and rape.
The problem has become so acute that a new clinic for children suffering post-traumatic stress disorder will be opening this month in Baghdad. It will be the first of its kind in Iraq.
Dhiya Moussa, 11, is a stocky child with shaggy brown hair. He cautiously answers questions from Dr. Haider Maliki, and confesses he still can't fall asleep at night.
"I am afraid of darkness," Moussa says. "After I was released, I was afraid to stay alone in the dark. I don't know why. When I enter into a dark room I get frightened, I immediately switch on the light and run away."
As he is talking, Moussa keeps looking to his father for reassurance.
Pharmacist Moussa Hussein Hassan says his son was kidnapped in 2004, but he still crawls into bed every night with him and his wife.
"My son was held for seven days before they released him," Hassan says. "They locked him in a shed all by himself with rats in the darkness. Before he was kidnapped, he was never afraid. But after that he became terrified of the dark. He goes to bed very late at night and he can only sleep after exhausting himself. He insists on burying his head under my arm to feel safe when he sleeps."
Moussa also developed memory loss and initially wouldn't mingle with other children. Things got so bad that his father brought him to Dr. Maliki.
Maliki, a psychiatrist, has treated hundreds of children at the Central Pediatric Teaching Hospital in Baghdad where he works. Their stories he says are heartbreaking.
"Of course, we have many children," Maliki says. "I have a female, she [is] 13-years-old. She exposed to kidnapped. They raped her and made sexual intercourse with her for about 4 days daily."
The result is that many develop post traumatic stress disorder or PTSD.
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