Aspetti psicosociali nelle funzioni di base

One of the principal merits of the Guidelines for mental health and psychosocialsupport in emergency settings issued by the Inter-Agency Standing Committee/IASC has been that of attributing a psychosocial value to all those functions considered“less noble” in such post-emergency settings as rescue camps – the socalledbasic functions. Indeed, a series of psychic connotations is inherent in allthe issues relating to nutrition and safety in alimentation, the logistic of the managementof post-emergency gathering points, and the water supply and the hygienicservices. These psychic connotations are mainly due to the special nature ofthe circumstance, in which such fundamental functions necessarily have manyfeatures of strong social sharing.This article focuses on these basic functions. In particular, it discusses the waythey appeared and have been dealt with during the emergency caused by theearthquake that hit L’Aquila on the 6th of April 2009. To this end, it will be attemptedto do a review of all of the basic functions highlighted by the IASC’sGuidelines, analyzing the psychosocial aspects implicated in them and offering arange of operative instructions on how to protect the mental health of people inthese aspects as well as others.