Category Archives: English

There is a peculiar unease many of us recognise but rarely articulate. We are entertained constantly, informed endlessly, stimulated relentlessly — and yet, afterward, something feels thin. The sensation is not boredom. It is not dissatisfaction. It is more like emptiness after fullness, or satiety without nourishment. Everything works. Nothing stays. This essay is not…

Note: This article was written soon after the 2015 Presidential Election.   Who will win the health battle in Sri Lanka: People or Big Corporations?  Sri Lanka was a typical low income country in most ways except with regards to health indicators. For many decades, maternal mortality and life expectancy were impressive. Indicators related to general…

In your professional psychiatric opinion to what do you attribute road accidents to? What is the psychiatric aspect to road accidents? Road accidents are not under the purview of psychiatrists but under transport experts. However, psychology has a very important role here. From here onwards I would be mostly commenting as an expert of psychology…

Why Mental Health is actually going to get better after the war? Sri Lanka was a typical low income country in most ways except with regards to health indices for many decades. Sri Lanka’s indices of general well-being, such as maternal mortality rate and life expectancy, and also indices related to well-being such as literacy…

Are competitive sports good for kids? What are competitive sports? Sports is not beating each other (including its literal meaning as well) in whatever way possible. Getting off the blocks before others do so you reach the finish line first. Jumping high and winning by playing with disabled people. Injuring the best bowler by thumping…

Is marriage a fountain of happiness or a source of suffering? In the current day Sri Lanka, wedding ceremony has superseded marriage in importance. Some of us spend years, if not decades, preparing for our weddings. We spend enormous amounts of money, often borrowed at a high interest, on the function. A vast number of…

Health: Whose Responsibility Is It? The first International Conference on Health Promotion, meeting in Ottawa on the 21st day of November 1986, presented their charter for action to achieve Health for All by the year 2000 and beyond. The charter stated that ‘health promotion’ is the process of enabling people to increase control over, and…

Suicide Why are we not taking this issue seriously? Suicide is a major happening particularly in Sri Lanka. In the mid-nineties Sri Lanka had a dreadful record showing a stand of “World’s No. 1 suicide rate”. At that time over forty people died out of every 100,000 within a year. The cause of death was…