{"id":116258,"date":"2025-09-03T08:14:06","date_gmt":"2025-09-03T08:14:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/116258\/"},"modified":"2025-09-03T08:14:06","modified_gmt":"2025-09-03T08:14:06","slug":"mental-health-survey-set-up-for-west-yorkshire-flood-victims","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/116258\/","title":{"rendered":"Mental health survey set up for West Yorkshire flood victims"},"content":{"rendered":"

People across West Yorkshire are being urged to complete a survey aimed at reducing the impact flooding has on mental health.<\/p>\n

The Mental Health Needs Assessment will be used to evaluate the impact of natural disasters on individuals and help contribute to the introduction of more flood-specific mental health services.<\/p>\n

It is being carried out by Kirklees Council and researchers at the University of Huddersfield as part of the West Yorkshire Flood Innovation Programme (WYFLIP)<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Councillor Amanda Pinnock, Kirklees Council’s Cabinet member for communities and environment, said findings from the survey would go on to help flood victims “recover with compassionate and understanding support”.<\/p>\n

West Yorkshire has been badly affected by flooding in the last decade.<\/p>\n

The 2015 Boxing Day floods alone caused an estimated \u00a3150m worth of damage across the county.<\/p>\n

Research has shown that people whose homes have been flooded are six times more likely to have post-traumatic stress disorder, depression and anxiety<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Katie Kimber, spokesperson for WYFLIP and Calderdale councillor, has been a flood warden in the Calder Valley for almost 10 years.<\/p>\n

She says: “People can access mental health services but in relation to flooding alone it’s not something that is there. It’s a gap where we just don’t have stuff that deals with it.<\/p>\n

“Some people get on with their lives and aren’t affected by it but there are a huge numbers of people who just can’t function after it’s happened.<\/p>\n

“It just remains with them as a fear and causes terrible anxiety, and it’s one of those areas that’s really overlooked in flood resilience.<\/p>\n

“A support network needs to be there. Once we know what people need we can look at how to service that.”<\/p>\n

The survey is part of a wider project led by Kirklees Council, focused on community resilience in response to flooding, which has received \u00a356,000 funding, largely from the Yorkshire Regional Flood and Coastal Committee.<\/p>\n

The questionnaires can be filled in online, with around 500 set to be distributed among communities at risk of flooding through local flood groups and flood managers.<\/p>\n

The next stage of the project will see 50 in-depth interviews carried out with households who have experienced or are at risk of flooding.<\/p>\n

Findings will then be used to develop resources alongside local authorities and housing organisations to assist with mental health support for victims of flooding.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"People across West Yorkshire are being urged to complete a survey aimed at reducing the impact flooding has…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":116259,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[49,48,84,393,394],"class_list":{"0":"post-116258","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mental-health","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-health","11":"tag-mental-health","12":"tag-mentalhealth"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/116258","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=116258"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/116258\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/116259"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=116258"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=116258"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=116258"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}