MONTGOMERY, Ala. — With more than half a million North Carolinians impacted from the destruction of Hurricane Helene, many of those displaced are suffering with severe mental health struggles, according to Lisa Jones, an Alabama nurse who volunteered to provide aid for impacted residents.
“One lady, she had a stroke, I think (because of) the stress of the whole situation, we’re seeing a lot of that,” Jones told Alabama Daily News Thursday via telephone. “A lot of mental health needs, we were seeing people just freaking out; people lost everything.”
Jones is among eight nurses who volunteered on behalf of the Alabama Department of Public Health to travel to North Carolina to provide aid for displaced residents. Arriving on Oct. 13, Jones and her team are working 12-hour shifts at an American Red Cross shelter in Hendersonville, and will remain in the state until Nov. 4.
The eight-nurse team was sent as part of the Emergency Medical Aid Compact, an interstate agreement to provide assistance in instances of disasters, natural or otherwise.
Back in Montgomery, Alabama Public Health Officer Dr. Scott Harris gave members of the State Public Health Board an update on the effort.
“They seem to be doing very well, we’re getting regular updates from them,” Harris said Thursday, speaking at the board’s meeting in Montgomery. “We immediately had people volunteer to do that, we just have the best folks who work in public health and they were ready to go.”
Jones said that she and her team of nurses were preparing to be assigned to a different shelter in Hudson, and that the shelter in Hendersonville would be subsequently shut down, something, she said, only exacerbated displaced residents’ mental health struggles.
“The shelter’s about to close so they’re starting to panic because they don’t know where they’re going,” Jones said.
“The mental health status of people here, I don’t have words for it. They’re scared, some of them already had mental health issues, and this has just exacerbated that. We have a lot of people (where) the state of their mentality is that they’re manic; they’re running around, they’re washing their hair 15 times a day.”
Areas in North Carolina most impacted by the hurricane also tended to have higher numbers of older adults and people with disabilities, further exacerbating the mental health vulnerabilities of those displaced.
Hurricane Helene is already among the deadliest mainland hurricanes in the United States, with the death toll surpassing 230 as of Oct. 7, and damages estimated to be in excess of $50 billion. Further still, just 1% of homeowners outside of Florida hit by flooding during the hurricane had flood insurance, contributing to the economic losses of those impacted.
“The devastation is just incredible,” Harris said, speaking of the damage seen in North Carolina.
“We had a national call in which the (state) health officer spoke last week, and fully a third of the state has no infrastructure, and the way she described it is that it’s not that (they) don’t have the water, it’s that (they) don’t have water plants and pipes in the ground.”
Despite the somber circumstances of working amid the devastation caused by the hurricane and those impacted by it, Jones said the work was “very rewarding,” and that her desire to help people is what led her to volunteer for the trip.
“I’ve been with Public Health for 18 years, and always have been willing to go, and this was an opportunity to go and help a lot of people,” she said.
