 Hi, how are you? I hope you're doing well. My name is Ndanya and welcome to SPM Buzz. As I told you earlier, I'm here at the Tamarin Hotel for Mental Health Summit. And guys, you have to see who I'm with. So, please introduce yourself, what you do. Thank you so much Ndanya. My name is Amathim Tiso and I'm a mental health advocate. I work for the Coalition Action for Prevative Mental Health as the Executive Director and equally the founder. This is a coalition of mental health organization in the country and also outside. Right now, we have about 120 organizations in it and what we do is advocate for more investments at community level for preventive mental illness and promotion of mental health. That's what we do. Yes. Off camera, you mentioned something to do with, what did you say about taking care of people with the crimes? The crimes for mental health like suicide, committing things like that. Please go in details about that. Yes. For some time, mental health has been criminalized in that persons who have mental... Like I'm so far away. Person who have mental health issues and challenges more often than not, they have found themselves behind bars for one reason or another because of laws that criminalize mental health issues. And one of such laws is the Attempted Suicide Act, which says that if you attempt to take your own life, it's a misdemeanor, you're supposed to be jailed for two years. And more often than not, people who attempt to take their life, there is a background of trauma, mental health issues and so on. So we are actually in court right now as an organization to petition the court to decriminalize this law. Okay. The other law is that also criminalizes mental health within the penal code. And these under the Drugs and Narcotics Act. More often than not, people who have found in possession of some drugs that they use to mask pain because in mental health we believe addiction is a coping mechanism. More often than not, these people who use drugs end up finding themselves in prison for using drugs to mask their pain or to heal their emotional and traumatic pains. And these are mostly youths. So you find our prisons are congested by youths who are found with one joint of cannabis and they are just masking their pain. It's the same way as somebody who's taking alcohol or antidepressants. They have painful experiences that they're just trying to mask them or to go through them to help them cope with those situations. So we are advocating for such laws to be changed or to be done away with. Yes. But how do you differentiate between masking pain and just using drugs for fun? Whether it's for fun or masking pain, there is an element of addiction in it. Okay. At some point when it becomes addicted. Even if it's for fun, why would you be taken to jail for having fun with cannabis? Why are you not being taken to jail for having fun with alcohol? Yes. Okay, but even if cannabis is worse, you know. It has been proven daily that it's not as each person as we live has something we call an endocannabinoid system in the body. We have an element of THC. It only depends on which, how much it is in the body. So these are studies that are coming out daily. And we know that the UN, even cannabis can be used to treat other mental health issues, autism, bipolar and so on and so forth. And that's why the World Health Organization has rescheduled cannabis for research, medicinal research to be done. And Kenya, we are just lagging behind to implement or change the laws of cannabis. Nakada knows this. The government knows this. We are state party. We are just, I don't know why we are not doing it. I have a question. I'm not even curious. You said cannabis can be used to treat autism. But I'm thinking cannabis makes you hyper. And someone who's autistic is someone who's already very hyper. How does it treat? First of all, there are some details that are very technical in my position not to answer. But data is there. Research is there. I'll give you the assignment to go and look into it. But it has been said that each person, like I've said earlier, each person has an element of endocannabinoid system in the body. And it's the most strongest system in human beings. We have digestive systems. We have respiratory systems. We also have something we call endocannabinoid system that works together. The receptors of cannabis and our human body work together. So it's all about the percentage of THC and all that. So it's big. And that's why it's been used. It's been given to kids who are autistic. This way it stabilizes them. Okay. And even other persons who suffer from other mental health issues. Yes. That's much I can tell you about that. But I can direct you to the endocannabinoid system. You can have a look at it. It's online. There's a lot of literature on it. Even how cannabis treats other mental health diseases. There's a lot to it. That's homework for me. Okay. I'd like us to talk about depression and anxiety. And how do you... What's the difference between depression and anxiety? Fortunately and fortunately, like I said, my background is not clinical or theoretical mental health. I stumbled into mental health out of life experiences. Right now what I'm going through is a process of learning and studying more about trauma and adverse childhood experiences. So you might ask me about depression, anxiety. I may not be in a position to help you because I've focused my attention now to the systems of mental health. Why don't we have mental health preventive investments? Why don't we have mental health promotion investments? Why are we so focused on drugs? Why are the community people are struggling with mental health issues? Why are we not having mental health conversations in churches? Why are we not having mental health conversations at the work? Why is suicide a crime? Those are the issues that I'm focusing on. Yes. Why are county governments not having allocations for mental health? Yes. Why do we have to build maybe an hospital in Kajiyado instead of having mental health services at the dispensary level? Those are the questions that I try to answer and look for solutions for. Yes. And so far so good. I'm learning a lot from you, but I'd like you to tell us since you started this journey, what are your challenges mostly? Mental health itself is a challenge in itself and especially systematically there have been institutional challenges and also which have promoted towards perpetuating stigma. This could be legal challenges, could be political challenges, could be financial challenges and so on. There are also social challenges that have been brought about by the mental health professions. I'm not saying they are not doing much, they have done their level best but this time they open up these conversations. For people now, you have realized that the social and environmental determinants of mental health are here with us. What does that mean? We need to look at mental health holistically. There are various intersections of mental health from housing, how it contributes to mental health breakdown, from water, sanitation, agriculture, droughts, transport. You cannot deal with mental health from a diagnosis or disorder perspective always or from a perspective of medication. We need to look at systems. How is our transport system contributing to mental health? How is matatu culture affecting us? How is our housing in formal sentimentals, formal sentimentals? How is it affecting our mental health? How is our education system impacting or affecting our mental health? How is our even agriculture and food system nutrition? What do we need? How does it affect our mental health? We need to look at mental health actually from all the 17 SDGs. Even including justice system. How does it contribute to having perhaps more mental health issues? So if you look at those aspects, those perspectives and how each individual and societies and corporate organizations can come into the conversation of how we can build resilience, then that will be a win. And those are the things that I'm looking for. And those are the challenges that I'm seeking solutions for and other members of the coalition and other partner organizations. Yes. Okay, as we wind up, let's take just one example, the matatu culture. Just can you give us in details, tell us in details how you think the matatu culture affects the common monanchist mental health? Ah, good question. Suppose you're coming from, let's say, Shokimau and you've taken a matatu. Number one, the matatu is not designed to be carrying passengers as it is. So definitely there is an issue of sitting position that affects you. So number one, you are irritated on how there is no comfort. Matatu ideally, the 14 sitters are not supposed to carry anybody. Even the bigger sitters that we have, the way they are being built, they are not supposed to carry human beings. Okay, that's one. Number two, the idea that this matatu, I'm not sure where it's going even to stop me. Or which route it's going to pass. That's a mental health distress in itself. Number three, I might have planned for my fare to be 100. But I could reach the stage and my fare is... Oh, it's not reading, suddenly my fare is 150. What does that do to my budget and my mental health? It increases my mental load. If, for example, I was going home and I was supposed to buy milk, I might not go home with milk. And what will happen to my child or my wife, GBV, will fight over that milk that I never brought. Is here it contributes. And then of course, the idea that even matatu itself, matatu culture, does not at some point contribute entirely fully to the economy. Because here we have drivers, we have touts. Are they taxed? They are income. Do they pay as yuan? They don't have payslips. And daily they use our roads, which we pay more for. Yet they are digging on that road. So in the entire, even where matatu stop and how noisy they become. For example, they are tout shouting all the time. That is noise pollution. And that affects your mental health. You don't want to listen to such noisy and loud music in a matatu, in a transport system that is public. Number three, look at even the way the matatu are. Abilled graffiti designs. What does that imply? That's disorder. Because what are they attracting? How is that disorder? It's a disorder in this sense because it creates destruction in the system. And everything that is great destruction in a public system is a disorder. And that's why we talk about mental health disorders. Yes. And even transport disorders. Matatu is ideal even when you come to Nairobi itself. They have no designated stopping centers. Or bus stops. The bus stops that we know for example in Nairobi is either the bus station or the railway station. Koja Mosk Or down there country bus. Every other place that matatu stop they are not ideally supposed to stop there. So that means they obstruct everybody. That's a disorder in itself. And this disorder is what happens to us. Once I agree with you, I transfer stress to you. Instead of you transforming it, what will happen? High chances that you're going to transfer it. So the first point of stress in this country that people go through is in the transport system. And by the time they reach their offices they start transferring that trauma to their colleagues. They start transferring that trauma to the people who come for services. They don't serve you well. And the entire country is frustrated. So the first step even for a country to heal is to have a system and orderly transport system. That's the first step. And that's why countries that have not understood this they create first of all public systems that are orderly. So that everybody can plug in. They know it's consistent. They know it delivers. They know it's effective. It's efficient. Do you think it's possible with the Nairobi household, the culture? Is it possible to get that order? Yes, it is possible. That's why even this summit is called. Ah, okay. Yes, it is possible. Everything is possible. Even beyond our imagination. But we need to look at even historically. Sorry, where did this begin from? Where did it start from? And how can we stop it? It's a cycle. What interventions can we put in place? Is it starting from the political goodwill? We need to polarize everything in this country. Which happens to be also a traumatic experience in itself. We're just perpetuating the cycle of trauma. So we need to look at historically where Matatu came from. What can we do? We need to support good initiatives. We need to be positive about good initiatives that have the best interest of the public at heart. We don't need to be always negative, always opposing, always creating barriers. When something is good, wherever political divide you come from, we need to give it a thumbs up and support it. Okay, so it's possible. We have a lot of negativity going around in the country at the moment. For whatever reasons, we need to have a new narrative. We need to change our minds from our churches, to schools, to homes, to jobs, workplaces. We need to start thinking positive. Then eventually everything becomes possible and falls in place. I agree. Positivity all the way. Thank you so much, sir. We've learned a thing or two and homework for me. So how can someone reach you if someone wants to reach you? We are the coalition action for preventive mental health. Our email address is capmhkenya at gmail.com and my number is 0701 385 386. We'll write it there when editing. Thank you so much. Have a good evening.