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Background.In 2014, over a million people were internally displaced after the launch of a military operation in North Waziristan, a tribal region on Pakistan's side of the Durand Line. Despite security concerns and restrictions, a collaborative mental health and psychosocial support initiative was undertaken in the district of Bannu. Monthly mental health camps were conducted for a period of 6 months by a multidisciplinary mental health team. The initiative also helped to assess mental health needs and plan training for primary care staff to strengthen existing resources.Methods.As part of this initiative, Mental Health Gap Action Programme (mhGAP) training was conducted for physicians and psychosocial staff in the affected district. This marked the first instance of implementing these guidelines in Pakistan following a humanitarian crisis. This paper describes the training process including the adaptation of the mhGAP curriculum, training of trainers, training workshops for primary care staff and an analysis of results of pre- and post-testing of their knowledge about common mental disorders using a 25-item questionnaire.Results.The gaps in knowledge of primary care physicians in recognizing and managing common mental disorders were clearly identified. The mean pre- and post-test scores of the participants were 15.43, 62% (p value 0.000, s.d. 4.05) and 19.48, 78% (p value 0.000, s.d. 3.13) respectively, which showed significant improvement.Conclusions.Despite the challenges of a humanitarian crisis, mhGAP guidelines can be successfully implemented to train primary care physicians in in low- and middle-income countries such as Pakistan. However, the dearth of primary care resources can hinder the complete integration of mental health services into primary healthcare.

The Indian subcontinent comprises eight countries (India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Afghanistan, Bhutan, and the Maldives) and a collective population of more than 1.3 billion people. 10% of the world's suicides (more than 100,000 people) take place in just three of these countries, viz. India, Sri Lanka, and Pakistan. There is very little information on suicides from the other four countries. Some differences from suicides in Western countries include the high use of organophosphate insecticides, larger numbers of married women, fewer elderly subjects, and interpersonal relationship problems and life events as important causative factors. There is need for more and better information regarding suicide in the countries of the Indian subcontinent. In particular, studies must address culture-specific risk factors associated with suicide in these countries. The prevention of this important public health problem in an area of the world with myriad socio-economic problems, meager resources, and stigmatization of mental illness poses a formidable challenge to mental health professionals, policy makers, and governments of these countries.

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The production of hydrogen fuels, via water splitting, is of practical relevance for meeting global energy needs and mitigating the environmental consequences of fossil-fuel-based transportation. Water photoelectrolysis has been proposed...