Justyn Green, 12, and his brother Jaleel, 8, spent six days at the Louisiana Superdome in New Orleans with their mother and father -- hot, hungry, thirsty, dirty and frightened. They heard gunfire and saw dead people. They got out at one point, only to be forced to return when police in a nearby town turned away thousands of evacuees at gunpoint. When they finally boarded a bus to leave -- after enduring a line so long they could barely stand -- they thought the horror was over, but it wasn't. The bus flipped over near Opelousas, and their father was killed.
The boys "didn't say a word" at the Superdome, said their mother, Joy Green. "They looked so lost and scared. There was no security at all. You were on your own."
The boys still don't talk much.
For Many of Katrina's Young Victims, The Scars Are More Than Skin Deep
By Julia Cass
Special to The Washington Post
Tuesday, June 13, 2006; A01
NEW ORLEANS -- This year's hurricane season has just begun, and already it is producing a new surge of anxiety in Gulf Coast children.
Children at a day-care center in Gautier, Miss., ask their caregivers every day: "Did you watch the Weather Channel? What does the Weather Channel say?" In a New Orleans trailer park, a 12-year-old boy who spent five days outside the convention center after Hurricane Katrina and saw a woman in a wheelchair slowly die pleads with his mother to buy a car so they can escape the next big one. An 8-year-old girl is convinced that another hurricane will hit New Orleans -- she is even sure it will be on June 15 and a Category 8 (a rating that doesn't exist).
Ten months after Katrina, its emotional effect on children is proving to be long and lasting. Two studies of children affected by the hurricane have found high rates of depression, anxiety, behavioral problems and post-traumatic stress disorder.
A Louisiana State University mental health screening of nearly 5,000 children in schools and temporary housing in the state found that 96 percent saw hurricane damage to their homes or neighborhoods, 22 percent had relatives or friends who were injured, 14 percent had relatives or friends who died, and 35 percent lost pets. Thirty-four percent were separated from their primary caregivers at some point; 9 percent still are.
The concern for the Katrina children is not just the immediate trauma from the storm, but that so much of their lives remains disrupted.
