Among the hardest hit victims of the Covid health crisis are around 600 refugees from all over the world living in Newham and awaiting the results of their asylum claims.

Because of the pandemic many of them have been isolated in hostels and small hotels, and they are all, to a lesser or greater extent, suffering from depression or post-traumatic stress disorder says Simon Shaw, a teacher in West Ham who is also a campaigner for refugee rights.

“This morning I met a man from Iran who can’t get the trauma of crossing the channel out of his head and cannot sleep,” he said. “His 18 month old daughter has a tantrum when she sees water, his wife is suicidal. And yesterday I met a woman from Pakistan who has two young children and is fleeing from domestic abuse and when I said she was brave, she said; when a lion chases you, you have to run.”

Another story concerns a young man from Sierra Leone who lives in a house with four other refugees, his final appeal to stay in the UK is this month; he lost his whole family in a mudslide. He is recovering from a stroke, he has lost toes, and he has very difficult days.

According to the Refugee Council refugees and asylum seekers are five times more likely to receive mental health support than other people in the UK and more than 60 per cent of them experience severe mental distress.

They receive paltry official support – receiving just £5 a day from the government to cover the basic necessities – and they are banned from working. According to the Refugee Council there were almost 30,000 asylum applications in the UK last year, down by 18 percent on the previous year, mainly due to the impact of COVID-19.

In camps on the outskirts of major cities, or in safe houses, or on the pavements of capital cities across Europe up to million people are seeking asylum, many of them suffering from depression, PTSD, anxiety, self-harming, insomnia and panic attacks and all of them trapped in fear and uncertainty.

Care4Calais in east London has provided clothes, hygiene products and toys to around 120 refugees staying in hotels in Newham. Their nationalities were representative of the trouble spots in the world today: Honduras, El Salvador, Sudan, Palestine, Afghanistan, Syria and Gambia.

To more information on CareforCalais go to www.care4calais.org

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