FROM THE FIELD: Venezuelan refugee counsellor hears ‘pain, anger and frustration’

Government figures suggest that there are 4.5 million Venezuelans who are living overseas as refugees or migrants.

FROM THE FIELD: Venezuelan refugee counsellor hears ‘pain, anger and frustration’

15 May 2020 Migrants and Refugees

A Venezuelan psychologist who moved to Peru as a refugee, has been telling the UN refugee agency, UNHCR, about the “pain, anger and frustration” that has been expressed by fellow displaced and local people he has counselled.

David Marín Cabrera arrived in the Peruvian city, Cusco with his family in 2018, after fleeing Venezuela and has provided face-to-face psychological counselling, which now, due to the coronavirus pandemic, has moved online.

**© UNHCR/Regina de la Portilla** | David Marín Cabrera is a Venezuelan psychologist living in Cuzco, Peru.

The confinement of people in Peru to their homes as a response to the pandemic has intensified already difficult conditions for refugees and others.

UNHCR reports government figures which suggest that worldwide, there are some 4.5 million Venezuelan refugees and migrants; around 15 per cent of the South American country’s total population.

Read more here about how Mr. Cabrera and other refugee psychologists are helping to alleviate the mental health problems in their community.

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