Description
: Monbondhu is a Facebook Messenger Chatbot in Bangla to give mental support to the user and help women regarding domestic violence. Previous pandemics like the Spanish Flu in 1918-1920 showed a rise in psychological problems in patients suffering from the flu. Psychological disturbance among survivors is also a common scenario during a pandemic. The most common symptoms of a survivor are intense suffering, suicidal behaviour, depression, and acute stress reactions. The World Health Organization (WHO) has already warned us regarding the negative impact of the coronavirus crisis on people’s mental health.
In the last few months, at least three people committed suicide due to anxiety and depression in Bangladesh. A very simple and implementable solution to overcome this mental health issue is a conversation or to consult with someone. Studies have shown that during traumatic events like a pandemic, expressing inner curiosity, anxiousness, and frustration can be very helpful to maintain sound mental health.
That’s why we have introduced Facebook’s Messenger API called “ChatBot” to remedy this issue and named it ‘MonBondhu’. This solution is implementable at this very moment and a lot of people can be reached within a very short time as more than 33 million people use Facebook in Bangladesh and people are used to with the simple interface.
Through this ChatBot, many people will be able to reduce their anxiety. The bot will suggest movies, books, activities that will help the user to remain distracted from the frustrating situation of the pandemic. It will also check if the user has symptoms of Corona or not and will take steps accordingly. If the user is depressed and needs professional help there will be an option to manually describe the present situation of the user and it will be sent to a group of professional psychiatrists. Psychiatrists who will be available will be assigned to help the user and will be able to help a lot of people just sitting at home without endangering their lives. Users will also be able to report domestic violence to authority through the ChatBot.
By using the ChatBot people who are fighting this pandemic endangering their lives will find someone to share their mental situation. People who have lost their loved ones will find some consolation and inspiration to move on. The rate of suicides after the pandemic, as seen after previous pandemics, will decrease as the professionals will be able to handle the situation by communicating with mass people.
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See our presentation: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1W6eM7fkPHDP-LBt9-YeXQt-HDhOZ22gC
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Video Link(Fb): https://www.facebook.com/113117117049095/videos/237301217521855/
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