Conflict, forced displacement and health in Sri Lanka: a review of the research landscape.
Sri Lanka has recently emerged from nearly three decades of protracted conflict, which came to an end five years ago in 2009. A number of researchers have explored the devastating effect the conflict has had on public health, and its impact on Sri Lanka's health system - hailed as a success story in the South Asian region. Remarkably, no attempt has been made to synthesize the findings of such studies in order to build an evidence-informed research platform. This review aims to map the 'research landscape' on the impact of conflict on health in Sri Lanka. Findings highlight health status in select groups within affected communities and unmet needs of health systems in post-conflict regions. We contend that Sri Lanka's post-conflict research landscape requires exploration of individual, community and health system resilience, to provide better evidence for health programs and interventions after 26 years of conflict.
Department of Psychological Medicine, Institute of Psychiatry, King's College London, London, UK ; Faculty of Medical Sciences, Anglia Ruskin University, Chelmsford, UK ; Institute for Research & Development, Sri Jayawardenepura Kotte, Sri Lanka.
Chesmal
C
Siriwardhana
School of Public Health and Community Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of NSW Sydney, Sydney, Australia ; International Organization for Migration, Colombo, Sri Lanka.
Kolitha
K
Wickramage
Civil conflict; Health; Health research; Health systems; Internal displacement; Mental health; Post-conflict; Sri Lanka