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Artūras’s sister, Gerda, approached the Lithuanian Embassy in India and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and asked her brother to be escorted to Lithuania. The woman has already paid for a plane ticket for her brother, agrees to pay for another, but does not know how to ensure that the trip from India to Lithuania is a success. If Artūras returned, the Lithuanian municipality could organize an ambulance and the man would be hospitalized.
For its part, the Lithuanian Embassy in India is trying to get Artūras to receive psychiatric treatment in a foreign country, but it cannot organize an escort, the legislation does not allow it. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs recommends considering the possibility of relatives coming to India themselves and helping Artūras to return to Lithuania.
But the worst thing is that without treatment, the situation only worsens: Arthur resorts to conflicts in the alien deportation center, has visual hallucinations, a man exhibits his naked body. Family members said the guy was beaten because possibly other residents did not hate his behavior.
He worked as a taxi driver in Lithuania, but in India the disease showed face
According to relatives, Arthur suffers from paranoid schizophrenia, but since it is not a mental disability but a mental disability, the man was able to live a fairly full life and work as a taxi driver while taking medication. If the illness worsened, Artūras went to the hospital.
According to Gerda, Arthur left for India in 2019 for unclear reasons. In India, according to her sister, her brother was wandering, volunteering at a dog shelter and was repeatedly missing. However, in March this year, Arthur was detained by Indian migration officials because the boy’s visa had expired, making his stay in the country illegal. He was housed at the Delhi Foreigners Deportation Center.
Because Arthur has not taken medication for some time, his health is currently extremely poor: not only is the man unable to return home alone, but he is hallucinating, hears voices, strips off his clothes, harasses people, climbs into the trees and can’t get in touch with a sister who tries to talk to him remotely.
Gerda says she initially thought she would deport her brother, but the embassy explained that relatives had to buy Arthur a ticket home and pay for a temporary return certificate. It all cost 478 euros, but the woman agreed to pay for the trip and documents, even though she required a loan.
The trip was due to take place on April 23 this year, but the embassy unexpectedly announced that Arthur had not been approached: the man had taken off his clothes at the Delhi airport, harassed other people and returned to the Alien Registration Center. Organizing your next arrival would require buying the tickets again and paying for another temporary return certificate.
“We asked the embassy to call a psychiatrist from the center where he is currently staying. We hoped that after a cure, he would be allowed to get on the plane and return to Lithuania without any problem. At the end of April, Arthur was called to a psychiatrist. , he prescribed the medication for ten days, but the medication was for sleep disorders. Usually, he took much more serious medications and, generally, when the illness got worse, he was treated in a psychiatric hospital in Lithuania, “explained Gerda .
The woman asked the Lithuanian embassy in India to provide an escort for her brother, but so far her wish remains unfulfilled; These services are not provided under Lithuanian law.
“Since mid-April, the problem has been solved: Lithuania cannot transport it, does not apply such services. You should go here with an escort as you need to be hospitalized. We write to all the institutions, but nobody helps ”, lamented Gerda.
According to the woman, in early June an employee of the Lithuanian embassy in India visited her brother at the foreign deportation center, but did not bring good news of the meeting: according to the center staff, Artūras’s mental condition worsened in a few months.
“Furthermore, the situation is aggravated by the fact that there are conflicts and violence between Arthur and other people who are detained there,” says Gerda.
The embassy cannot provide escorts to Lithuanians.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs, responsible for Lithuanian embassies abroad, admits that it is well aware of the situation, but cannot provide escorts from India to Lithuania, as this is not provided for in the legislation of our country.
“The Lithuanian Ministry or diplomatic missions are not authorized to carry out or finance the medical repatriation of Lithuanian citizens from foreign countries. According to the information available from the Indian authorities, this country is also unable to provide a medical escort funded by the Indian state during a person’s flight, ”says tv3.lt in the Ministry’s response.
According to officials, consular officials have repeatedly visited Arthur at the Alien Deportation Center, in constant contact with the man’s relatives, mediate the provision of medical care, and are currently seeking to have Arthur hospitalized in India. So far, effortlessly.
“The embassy has also made a note to the Indian Ministry of Foreign Affairs regarding a Lithuanian citizen, requesting to guarantee human rights, provide information on the situation and provide necessary medical assistance,” ministry representatives said.
To return Artūras to Lithuania, the Foreign Ministry offers relatives who apply for an insurance company or consider coming to India themselves and helping transport the man home.
When asked if she is not planning on going to bring her brother herself, Gerda says she has considered it, but it is quite complicated as long as Arthur is not receiving normal psychiatric treatment in India, the necessary medication is prescribed to control the disease. Otherwise, a situation similar to that of April may arise: Arthur may start to behave inappropriately at the airport, so he will probably not be allowed to get back on the plane.
“We don’t even know if Arthur would recognize her. And on what legal basis? After all, this is not a puppy, he is a grown man, he will not hold his hand, he will not bring him to the airport check-in,” he says. Gerda’s husband, Vytenis, noting that Artūras is considered a factor.
Vytenis says that in the cases of exacerbations, Artūras and Lithuania were characterized by super ideas, and then they were replaced by depression and aggression. One of these superides was a trip to India; Arthur prepared for it in three days and did not listen to requests from his relatives not to go anywhere.
“And it is not that you have borne fruit and you have borne. You need to see which medications are suitable, which can be too depressing. It’s easy to say “go ahead” then anyone can go. And that? Legally, it is active, but its current status is different. “Sometimes we talk and we do not give to God, is it going to happen that it does not return to normal?” Says the interlocutor.
Arthur’s sister Gerda says she also spoke with the embassy about private treatment for her brother, which relatives could pay if they increased the amount, but since Arthur is currently illegal in India, his visa has expired, which does Even harder. The decision to treat the man will likely be made by the Indian Immigration Bureau.
How can a person with a mental disability be transported?
Martynas Marcinkevičius, director of the Vilnius City Mental Health Center, says that situations like Artūras’s are not very rare, because people with all illnesses tend to travel nowadays, only that sometimes it becomes more difficult to return. to go.
“There are no problems in countries where the European Health Card is valid or if the person is insured. When these options are available, everything happens simply: a person enters a mental health institution in that country, is treated there, and if the condition is good enough or it is possible to cure enough that the person is calmer, then gives him an escort. and fly to Lithuania. And then we get in touch with the ambulance: they take the person straight off the plane and take us for further treatment. So there are no problems with civilized countries: we treat foreign citizens as well as many of our citizens are treated abroad ”, says the interlocutor.
Speaking of the Artūras situation, M. Marcinkevičius admitted that the situation is not normal. He says he cannot assess the progress of India’s psychiatric treatment, so it is difficult to predict whether Arthur would get help if he were admitted to a local hospital for at least some time. Only if Artūras does not have private health insurance and since it is not a European Union country, the question arises of paying for treatment immediately. Furthermore, we must not forget the pandemic situation that has brought the entire Indian medical system to its knees.
Paranoid schizophrenia is described by M. Marcinkevičius as a serious mental illness, characterized by a quite different course: benign, moderate and resistant. The quality of life of the patient often depends on the course.
“When the course is easy, a person has an episode of psychosis, but with treatment, these episodes may not recur for 5 to 10 years. In the moderate course, recurrences of psychosis are more frequent, but with treatment, a person can live a fairly normal life: both at work and study, and lead a normal social life. In addition, a lot depends on the person himself or his relatives, how well he can notice the deterioration in time and adjust the treatment. And there is a difficult or resistant course to treatment in which, despite treatment, it is difficult for a person to live a full life, even if he is not in constant psychosis. What we often face is that when people leave the hospital, they stop taking the medication after a few weeks. Without medication, this disease does not go away, it is a serious mental illness ”, says the psychiatrist.
When asked whether it would be possible to prescribe Arthur the medicines he needed in Lithuania and pass them through the embassy to the Indian Foreigners Deportation Center, Mr. Marcinkevičius found it quite difficult as it was not possible to prescribe medicines to a patient who was not treated. by a doctor and had severe psychosis.
“It is even more difficult, and who will make sure those drugs are used, especially if, as you say, the person is aggressive. There must be someone who makes sure they take those drugs correctly. And the patient must agree to drink them. And during those deteriorations, people simply do not want to take medication, they do not agree. I think that if I took the medication, a local doctor could also prescribe it. But if the situation is complicated, intensive hospital treatment is needed, “says my doctor.
He also points out that family members with whom he is in good contact can help the patient. According to M. Marcinkevičius, the presence of loved ones can be reassuring, because patients with acute illnesses often show aggression out of fear or stress, while controls at airports, flights are simply stressful.
“In some cases, relatives fly close to whom the patient feels safe and return to their country in peace. But all the cases are very individual ”, points out the interlocutor.
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