Clarin note
In the Malvinas War there were 649 Argentine casualties, 323 in the sinking of the General Belgrano cruise ship and 326 in the Malvinas Theater of Operations in different confrontations. When the war ended, there were a significant number of suicides. Although the State does not have official figures, it is estimated that there were between 350 and 450, in the period called the “demalvinization” process that included the military government and part of the democracy. The soldier veterans did not receive medical attention or support from the State.
Clarín interviewed Marisol Amoreo, a psychiatrist who has worked in assisting Malvinas veterans since 2004. She worked at the “El Dique” Hospital in Ensenada, as a subsidiary of the Provincial War Veteran Care Program in 2012. In 2019, she generated in the Hospital Reencuentro, a space for comprehensive care until March 2020. Today it continues with ad honorem care in its private office.
– What are the main traumas of the Malvinas ex-combatants?
– Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), to a greater or lesser extent, everyone suffered and suffers. Everyone has had vivid dreams of events that occurred in the Malvinas, the question of anguish. Situations type, “I already lived this”. Something that caught my attention when we were doing treatments at the Hospital Dique de Ensenada: everyone felt mobilized and alert to the sound of the helicopters. It was repetitive behavior.
– When is a behavior considered to constitute a disorder of this type?
– We are talking about chronic PTSD when six months have passed. In the first month it is called acute. I have present, some striking cases. One of the veterans told me that in his room he had a pantry where he stored food, like ten packets of noodles, ten packets of flour and other supplies. He couldn’t miss it due to the hunger he had suffered on the islands. A situation that sometimes caused him problems with his wife. Even today, after more than four decades, he continues to collect, but less.
– What other behaviors could you identify during your years of work?
– Another veteran who was in General Belgrano can take any liquid except water because he feels he is drowning. He can’t swallow water. A strong trauma. In addition, this veteran has other important consequences: hemiplegia on the right side of the body. The third case is that when sleeping he puts a fan at the foot of the bed to feel the wind on his face that he felt on the islands. That gives you peace of mind. Winter, summer, timelessly. It also causes him problems in living with his partner. That wind in his face makes him breathe easier.
– In addition to these behaviors, are there organic manifestations?
– Psychosomatic diseases. Itching, hives, stomach aches. There is a trend of involvement in the digestive system. As it is said, the digestive part is the second brain. Anxiety disorder, panic attack is a common denominator, Phobias. Gambling. Consumption of legal and illegal substances. Alcoholism is very present as well as smoking. Many have died very young from these addictions. It also depends on the basis of the personality of each one, the impact of the experience, as well as the ability to overcome.
– In Argentina there were no contemporary wars. Given the inexperience of which countries was used to carry out the treatments with veterans affected by PTSD?
– In 1997, we Buenos Aires doctors received a course, taught by veterans of the Vietnam and Korean wars. It was training to be able to address the issue of the aftermath of the war and post-traumatic stress syndrome. From there, group boardings began to be made at different veterans’ headquarters. In 2008, a group of veterans, headed by Julio Aro, traveled to London to learn about the treatments that were carried out to contain veterans affected by the Malvinas war. In Argentina there are very few professionals prepared to care for war veterans.
– In our country, are there specialized places for PTSD treatment for Malvinas veterans?
– There are no specialized places. Psychiatrists care for veterans for anxiety disorders but there are no competent establishments for this type of mental health illness. At the beginning of 2000, at the Carrillo de Tres de Febrero Hospital, the Malvinas Veteran Provincial Program began, at the initiative of the veterans themselves due to the critical situation they were suffering. It was a ministerial-level program where there were psychologists and psychiatrists who addressed those affected. It was never an official program. In La Plata, a sub-office was made in 2012 at the El Dique Hospital in Ensenada, where between fifty and sixty veterans were treated. There is no official record.
– How did they contact the ex-combatants?
– The team was made up of a recruiter, whose function was to approach colleagues with some problem and take them to the hospital for some assistance. The team was completed by a psychologist and me. Also with the methodology of group, individual and family work. We did not have a physical place to attend, they were lending us places inside the hospital. It was all very rudimentary. I also began to treat them in a particular way in my office. As a matter of gratitude and respect, the care was always free.
– Was there any other experience of this type in the following years?
– In 2019 I organized, at the Reencuentro de La Plata hospital, a center made up of clinical, dental, psychological, psychiatric and toxicological care for the issue of addictions. Unfortunately it stopped working in March 2020 due to the change of management. The veterans made a request to the Ministry of Health for continuity. There was no response and the service was stopped. Therefore, I continued to treat them in my office, but it is not the same as having a place of reference. There are two veterans who travel from the Coast to La Plata for me to take care of them, once a month. They are from San Clemente and Miramar.
– With respect to the psychological profile due to the age the soldiers were at that time: Were the damages greater due to the fact that they were almost adolescents?
– Personality develops until twenty, twenty-two years. The omnipotent fantasies, behaviors based on denial or idealization, typical of adolescents, were confronted with the brutal reality that a situation as traumatic as war represents. They weren’t ready. One question is to pursue a military career and another is to be civilians who from one day to the next put a weapon in your hand and you have to defend the homeland. For this reason, it is not uncommon that today we find veterans with obsessive, dependent, impulsive or explosive personality traits.
– Most veterans have a membership group with other veterans. How much does the collective help for individual healing?
– The degree of need to belong that veterans have is striking. What’s more, that is reflected even in the choice of a professional when it comes to doing a treatment. They included me as part of the group, because they feel understood. Sometimes they think that another psychiatrist is not going to understand them because he doesn’t know about Malvinas, because he doesn’t know what happened in Malvinas. In these years, they have told me so much about their life experiences that at one point there was a project for me to travel with them to the Malvinas.
– Is there a feeling of brotherhood?
– They feel like brothers. It is common to hear them say “my brother from the trench.” They lived it so hard that no one better than a couple to understand them. It also happens to them at the family level, sometimes beyond the depth of the bond, they feel that they cannot understand them
– More than four decades after the Malvinas war, based on your almost twenty-year experience with veterans, what should be done in mental health to contain and accompany them?
– Initially, train more professionals to care for war veterans. On the other hand, create centers for comprehensive care; they do not have to wander around looking for a psychiatrist through PAMI, through IOMA or a psychiatrist elsewhere, but instead they can go to an institution where they receive everything they need and corresponds to them Veterans should be cared for when they need it without delay.