SADAG reflects on a year since Lockdown
A year ago exactly, SADAG was hit with uncertain times and many restrictions to how we work and operate which has made the last 365 days the hardest and toughest year SADAG has ever had.
As we reflect on the year that’s passed, all of us in one way or another, were impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic. The mental well-being of millions of people around the world was severely affected. Depression, Anxiety, Grief and Trauma were also increasing on a daily basis in South Africa.
The question was, so how did we cope?
SADAG, like everyone, has had to meet unprecedented challenges, and make major adjustments just to keep our services open in order to help the many people that were calling and contacting us on a daily basis. We had to change all of our 30+ Helplines and a range of online systems for sms & whatsapp to an online app platform for our volunteer counsellors to answer calls remotely from home to continue helping those who were in desperate need for help.
Sponsorships, funding and private donations, which we are completely reliant on, fell short initially, however, we are extremely grateful to all the individuals, pharmaceutical companies, medical aid companies and corporations who stepped up to help us and have continued to support us despite the economy being severely impacted . Your kind sponsorships and donations have helped us to make a huge difference.
For example our calls have increased from 600 per day to over 1400 per day. We had to train more volunteer counsellors and Support Group Leaders. We still have over 160 operational Support Groups, with many who no run online groups through whatsapp, Zoom or Teams.
During this time, we were contacted by various Universities and Corporates looking to put in urgent mental health support programmes for their students or staff. SADAG were also proud to partner with SASOP, SAMA, SASA & PsySSA to launch the Healthcare Workers Care Network providing free mental health support services and have received over 1 000 calls from frontline healthcare workers during lockdown.
As well as launching the first-of-its-kind mental health support programme for NPOs, NGOs and Community Organisations called NPOwer in collaboration with Tshikululu Social Investments providing support to NPOs working on the front-line. We hosted over 103 online Facebook Fridays chats and many Webinars on various mental health topics including Anxiety, back-to-school Anxiety, Teen Suicide prevention, mental health in the workplace, COVID19 and mental health, compassion fatigue, Grief and many others.
We are fortunate to get the support of all mainstream media, print, online, television and radio. We have had over R169 Million Rands worth of media coverage in the past year. And our Board
Members have been constantly available to share their expert knowledge through interviews, webinars and online workshops.
SADAG has worked relentlessly over the last 12 months to ensure that our services are not interrupted and we are still able to be in contact with those in desperate need of mental healthcare. We are completely honored to be able to continue to provide this crucial support to communities around the country. The positive and beautiful messages, poems and letters we receive from people that we have helped. We appreciate it. Thank you to all those who send us feedback.
If you would like to donate to SADAG today to help us continue to help more people provide care and support , please click below to DONATE. We would greatly value your support.
Mental Health and Driver Fitness https://t.co/ALXsvlLTko #ArriveAlive #RoadSafety #MentalHealth #DriverFitness pic.twitter.com/VtyVsVgBA2
— Arrive Alive (@_ArriveAlive) March 17, 2021
