Returning U.K. Soldiers Suffer from Depression, Turn to Alcohol

The study, carried out by the King's Centre for military health research at the Institute of Psychiatry in London and published in the BioMed Central Psychiatry, found that 27 per cent of soldiers returning from either Iraq or Afghanistan have mental health issues whilst 18 per cent are abusing alcohol. Those percentages translate to 46,000 troops and 35,000 troops respectively. However there was a lower number of military personnel suffering from post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) than was anticipated, with some five percent of soldiers affected by an illness which often results from exposure to war or warlike conditions. Reuters reports that the study found little difference between the number of U.K. troops and those from the U.S. suffering from PTSD, although it was noted that reservists deployed from the U.K. to the conflict in Iraq were more susceptible to the condition than regular personnel or those reservists who had not been deployed. Depression and anxiety afflicts 13.5 percent of those returning from the two long-running conflicts. Stating that the figures it is quoting are drawn from a wider demographic than the military, Metro reports that within the general U.K. population 15 percent of people abuse alcohol and 25 percent have a mental health issue. Commenting on the study, in which 821 members of the military participated, in total 170,000 have been deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan from the U.K. since 2001, Amy Iversen of the King's Centre said:

Alcohol misuse and depressive disorders are much more common and therefore should be the primary focus for education, prevention and intervention. Although our perception is that post traumatic stress disorder symptoms are the main source of psychiatric illness in service personnel, alcohol misuse and depressive disorders are actually much more common

Senior members of the British military have often criticized the government for failing to provide adequate care for those suffering from mental trauma brought on by serving in Iraq and Afghanistan. The Ministry of Defense has spoken of how binge-drinking is a problem within British society as a whole but nevertheless has indicated that it will "do more to promote healthy attitudes to drinking' amongst its forces. Robert Marsh, a spokesman for Combat Stress, a Veterans charity that since 2005 has seen an increase of 66 percent in those using its services, added:

We are going to be overwhelmed with people needing help - how on earth are we going to deal with it? This is going to be the biggest increase since we began in World War I and it will put a huge strain on us and everyone else like the NHS. We are working with the government to come up with funding solutions

Suicide too can be a particular problem for those who have served in the military. Reuters says that a study has shown that young men who leave the British military are three times more likely to take their own lives than members of the general population whilst a U.S. study conducted in 2007 discovered that former male members of the U.S. military were twice as likely to kill themselves when compared to those who had never served in the armed forces.