The 2019–2020 bushfires and COVID‐19: The ongoing impact on the mental health of people living in rural and farming communities

It is well established that bushfires and other natural disasters have long-term effects on the mental health of affected individuals and communities (Black Dog Institute, 2020). These effects can last for years as demonstrated following the 2009 Black Saturday fires in Victoria, Australia: one fifth (21.9%) of the highest impacted communities reported mental health symptoms at the five-year follow-up (Gibbs et al. 2013). The recent 2019–2020 catastrophic bushfires in Australia was nothing like we have experienced before (Morton 2019), resulting in unprecedented devastation across much of the country with current estimates suggesting 14.5 million acres have been affected (White & Gilbert 2020) and numerous lives, houses, and livelihoods impacted. The 2019–2020 bushfires in New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia, Western Australia, and Tasmania caused much loss of life and property, environmental destruction, and community disturbance (Flanagan 2020), leaving an estimated one third of Australians now affected by the bushfires (Morton 2020). The last month of summer in the Northern Hemisphere has resulted in bushfires affecting and almost destroying small towns in the USA (Newburger, 2020). With predictions that globally, temperatures will continue to increase with more frequent heatwaves and less rainfall (CSIRO 2018), bushfires are likely to be a more frequent event, and the consequences of them being more widespread. The impact of the bushfires on individuals and communities is likely to be diverse. It is normal for individuals to be angry, frustrated, distressed, and anxious after these types of events. For those where losses are incurred, grief reactions are also common. Many may be so impacted, they go on to experience longer-lasting consequences such as post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, and complicated grief reactions that unless treated appropriately, can lead to a heightened risk of suicide. The total mental health impact of events like this can however take years to manifest (Llewellyn-Jones 2020). Rural communities are particularly vulnerable to bushfires, and the 2019–2020 bushfire events severely impacted Australian rural communities (Senate Finance and Public Administration Committees 2020). The bushfires had a particularly devastating impact on rural agricultural-based communities; in addition to the impact experienced by other bushfire-affected individuals in Australia, rural communities have lost farms which represent years of family income, livestock, and buildings essential to run farms effectively. These losses were especially tragic for Australian rural farming communities as they have struggled through many years of severe drought prior to the onset of the bushfires. Given that rural communities struggle to access mental health services as they are less available in rural and regional areas (Llewellyn-Jones 2020), this leaves these communities at greater risk of ongoing distress and disability. For primary producers, many lost not only their homes but livestock, crops, fencing, and machinery; the impact of the bushfires has decimated their livelihood, leaving minimal chance of full business recovery. This further impacts on their vulnerable mental health from the preceding years of drought, and for many primary producers, full recovery does not seem possible. Whilst mental health support was provided to rural and remote areas affected by the bushfires through telehealth services, with recipients being allocated 10-Medicare-funded counselling sessions through the Emergency Bushfire Support for Primary Producers, it is not enough. As time goes by and the countryside recovers from the devastation, we may be forgetting the long-term mental health impacts our farmers continue to experience. In Australia, policies for recovery after natural disaster events such as the recent bushfires tend to be crisis-driven. As a result, funding for essential services is provided during the time of a crisis, but removed or scaled back once the crisis is considered over. In the case of the recent bushfires, just as the green tips of grass and leaves of trees were returning, signalling hope for the future, the COVID-19 pandemic arrived. This has presented rural communities with exceptional challenges of dealing with the additional trauma of a pandemic. As a result, the recovery phase has been impacted severely for many communities and recovery efforts have halted across the country due to the pandemic and associated public health measures implemented to reduce the spread of the virus (McKnight 2020; Woodburn & Wheaton 2020). As a result, many small rural communities continue to struggle to access services in their areas and many individuals remain homeless and struggling to get on with everyday life. Given the number of recent disasters faced by these rural communities, the COVID-19 pandemic may just be too much for many who may go on to experience serious mental health outcomes from cumulative distress. The challenge is to come up with a sustainable path for recovery to support and provide mental health aid to community members facing these dual disasters. Higher levels of post-traumatic stress due to bushfires have been found to be linked with post-traumatic growth (i.e. growth after adversity) and avoidant coping (Hooper et al. 2018). So, it seems that avoidant coping could be helpful for people who are faced with profound, inexplainable loss. Experiencing trauma is generally associated with profound changes in how people make meaning of their lives. Rural communities face unique challenges, including collective trauma as a result of the disruption and damage to the social connectedness of a community (Smith & Burkle 2020). To remove rural disadvantage, it is important to increase provision of support by using different models of care, including telehealth delivery of mental health services, especially to young people, farmers, and volunteers who have been providing ongoing support for the drought, bushfires, and now COVID-19. Programmes related to empowering local communities are also crucial in rebuilding social connectedness. Finally, loss of employment and financial stressors also exacerbate the ongoing negative impacts on mental health. Government funding programmes such as unemployment benefits (e.g., JobSeeker and JobKeeker programmes, disaster recovery allowances) provide much needed safety nets and may help reduce negative mental health outcomes. For the rural communities of Australia impacted by the 2019–2020 bushfires, the federal government allocated one billion dollars to help rebuild communities. A plethora of grants were made available to aid recovery and repair community infrastructure, but the monetary value was minimal (most grants were capped at $75 000) with the time frame between application and receipt of funding extensive. The National Mental Health and Wellbeing Pandemic Response Plan (Department of Health 2020) outlines additional support acknowledging the burden of the pandemic is likely more severe on communities where existing vulnerability exists. The plan highlights the vulnerability of bushfire and drought-affected communities, yet the funding attached to the plan does not include specific avenues for these communities to attract the services and supports they need, especially in the longer term. Rural and farming communities have been coping with one disaster after another in recent years; they need more than short-term help to ensure recovery that is sustainable. None. No conflict of interest has been declared by the authors.