Psychiatric care in the DRC

Since 1998, more than five million people in the Democratic Republic of Congo have lost their lives in a series of wars that, taken together, are the deadliest since World War II.

Traditional medicine practitioners are the most common healthcare providers in the country’s eastern North Kivu region. Many of these practitioners believe that psychiatric illness is the result of black magic or demonic possession and thus use outlandish methods of treatment.

Source: Al Jazeera  Photos credit: Patrick Meinhardt/Transterra Media