Mental Health Issues in Indigenous People

Running Head: Mental health in Indigenous people
Health Issues on Indigenous People
Essay
System04104
5/22/2019

Mental health in Indigenous people
MENTAL HEALTH ISSUES IN INDIGENOUS PEOPLE
Introduction
The health and wellbeing of indigenous people still a major concern in Australia.
Every day there is news published in the newspaper about the health and poor conditions of
these people. Mental health issues are the major problem in Indigenous people (Hackett,
Feeny, & Tompa, 2016). The present work is also reviewing the three media articles and
analyse the content about the mental health issues in indigenous people. The present essay
provides an overview of the negative, positive, or neutral qualities of the article as per article
written by Stoneham, Goodman, and Daube (2014).
First Article
(Mental Health and Aboriginal People)
AIHW (2018). Mental Health and Aboriginal People [online]. Retrieve from:
https://anzmh.asn.au/2018/07/10/mental-health-aboriginal-people/
According to the First media news, the positive, negative, and neutral qualities as per
the Stoneham, Goodman, and Daube are as follow:
Positive: The third article shows the stats about the mental health of indigenous
people in Australia. It shows that indigenous people are normally suffering from depression
or dementia. It shows the real facts about the mental health conditions in indigenous people.
This article also shows the comparison about health issues between indigenous people and
normal Australians. This article shows the fact that more than 30% of people are suffering
from psychological distress in indigenous people in compare to 20% in all Australians. This
article shows that mental health condition is worsening every day in Australia in indigenous
people. The focus of this new article on government health programs and it includes that
Australian government and health programs need to consider long term view rather early start
and stop the programmes. The article also talks about the various risks and protective factors
associated with the Indigenous mental health conditions, which is not describe by the
Stoneham, Goodman, and Daube in their article (AIHW, 2018).

Mental health in Indigenous people
Negative: The negative thing about this article that it has not considered the practical
approach neither it discussed the culture or other factors such as employment, poverty, or role
of media in mental health conditions of indigenous people. The media article is almost
neglect the issues of media misrepresentation, which is especially mentioned in the
Stoneham, Goodman, and Daube (2014) article. However, it also avoids those cultural and
social factors such as racism, less opportunities for job, poor physical health conditions etc.
which plays a major role in indigenous mental health conditions. Although this media article
published on the website of Australian & New Zealand Health association (2018) but it is
very precise and unclear about the other factors behind poor mental health conditions of
indigenous and Torres Strait Islander’s people.
Neutral: This article mainly focuses on indigenous mental health problems and major
causes behind it. It also shows that how the failure of various government programs and
culture of indigenous people are major responsible causes behind poor mental health
conditions of indigenous people (Willox, Stephenson, Allen, Bourque, Drossos, Elgarøy, &
MacDonald, 2015). However, both article includes the major causes of mental health
problems and raise the voice against the poor mental health of indigenous people. However,
this article shows that the poor policies of government is a major cause behind the mental
health conditions of indigenous and Torres Strait Islander people.
Second Article
(Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander adolescent and youth health and wellbeing 2018)
Australia and New Zealand Mental Health Association (2018). Aboriginal and Torres Strait
Islander adolescent and youth health and wellbeing 2018 [online]. Retrieve from:
https://www.aihw.gov.au/reports/indigenous-australians/atsi-adolescent-youth-health-
wellbeing-2018/contents/summary
According to the second news, the positive, negative, and neutral qualities as per the
Stoneham, Goodman, and Daube are as follow:
Positive: The positive thing about this article news is that 76% of indigenous people
are happy while 24% are not happy. The second positive quality of this news is that total of
241,824 indigenous youth people in Australia who are 5% of Australian population. Among
them most of the young people are living in non-remote areas, thus they are not affected in