Senators push for a law that will cover police officers’ mental health.
Senators push for a law that will cover police officers’ mental health; The legislators cited that the cops are under pressure which in turn in turn interferes with their mental health.
This also comes after recent reports of police officers killing their family members for instances wives and children.
Nominated Senator Hamida stated,” There has been a recent spike of incidents involving police officers, including murder and suicide which have been linked to the state of mental wellbeing.”
“Police officers are usually first responders and are often exposed to traumatic scenes and chronic stressors such as, dangerous situations, injuries and violence coupled with the need to report and testify about psychologically stressful scenes,” she added.
Still on the motion, was the Majority Whip who highlighted that police officers put so much work but get little pay, and they have families looking up to them.
The majority whip stated,”This motion is important. She should go beyond it. Listening to her while moving it, it was clear that she has sufficient material to move it into a Bill, so that we can create legislation that can address the issues that make police officers to breakdown.”
“Police officers are serving under difficult circumstances. They do not have houses. Their payslips amount to nothing worth talking about. They do not have access to health facilities or insurance to meet hospital bills for members of their families,” he added.
According to statistics from a survey done last year, it was revealed that 12 to 13 per cent of the 110,000 police officers have mental health issues that are largely impacted by their work.
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