Victoria Cross hero Johnson Beharry recently revealed that depression had forced him to drive his car into a lamp-post at 100mph. The 30-year-old veteran was pushed to the edge after years of depression brought on by memories of his friends who died. Beharry was awarded the VC by the Queen in 2005 after twice saving his mates while under intense enemy fire.

‘This sad story illustrates that the horrors of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) can strike any Services veteran at any time,’ says Tony Banks, an ex-Paratrooper and campaigner for Services charity Combat Stress. ‘In March we launched our ‘The Enemy Within’ appeal, which hopes to raise the £30 million needed to develop the trauma treatment in our three short-stay residential centres, and to expand by deploying 14 outreach teams. Help and care needs to be ongoing and available to everyone who served on the battlefield.’

Combat Stress has a current caseload of 4,375 veterans. This includes 94 who have served in Afghanistan and 390 who served in Iraq. Last year, six new cases sought help from Combat Stress who had waited 50 years or more. A report for the MoD, published in The Lancet in May, concluded that the incidence of PTSD among actively deployed troops is between 3 and 4%. ‘Constant deployment of troops in Afghanistan following on from Iraq and the Gulf means that we are storing up a time bomb for the future,’ says Tony Banks.

Robert Marsh of Combat Stress agrees: ‘In the region of 180,000 individuals have served in Iraq or Afghanistan (to date) and if 4% of these suffer PTSD this will mean over 7,000 future sufferers. This is a huge number and about twice Combat Stress’s current caseload.’

When launching the Enemy Within appeal in March, Prince Charles, patron of Combat Stress, commented, ‘The unseen injuries of war – the nightmares, flashbacks, anxieties, depression, anger and guilt – in short, the psychological injuries, can render the sufferer totally incapacitated.’ Confirming this, L/Cl Beharry sums up: ‘My message to other soldiers feeling like this would be to talk to each other. If you keep it in until it blows up you could do something you regret – just like me.’

 

 

 

 

A young ex-soldier who was repeatedly turned down for jobs has inspired a new campaign to get bosses to ‘hire a hero’. Yusupha ‘Baresi’ Secka struggled for ten months to find work after he left the Army, until he met nursing agency boss Karen Chadwick. The 32-year-old told her how he had attended countless interviews but never landed a job. She, however, was impressed with him and took him on as a care worker. He has, she says, become ‘a fantastic ambassador’ for her company.

Now Ms Chadwick has joined forces with other businesses to launch the Hire A Hero campaign, to sweep away the prejudices against former Servicemen and women. She comments, ‘We have heard of more tales like Baresi’s, [but] if we all work together – businesses, resettlement organisations – to raise awareness and get better cohesion, then things can change.’
Hire A Hero has set up a Facebook page and may also be contacted via its telephone hotline: 0161 447 6147.

 

 

 

 

The website of the Service Personnel & Veterans Agency, Veterans-UK (www.veterans-uk.info) has been completely redesigned, and improvements have been made to almost all sections of the site. Major enhancements include a new home page with information now organised under nine core headings: Pensions and Compensation; Service Records, Medals and Badges; Welfare, Support and Contact; Special Support Programmes; Armed Forces Memorial; Veterans Community; Raising Awareness; and Veterans World.

Other new features include New Armed Forces Memorial pages, including a ‘Roll of Honour’ facility, and new interactive online advice services: working in partnership with ex-Service charities, Veterans-UK now offers interactive advice services that take users through a series of questions to identify their problem/issue before directing them to specialist organisations that can provide practical help and advice, on topics such as money matters, welfare and housing.