The Incidence of Mental Disease Among Refugees in Norway

Abstract

In Norway, the refugee problem has not been quantitatively significant. On the other hand, we have many examples to show that refugee work and interest for the fate of refugees has had an important position in the awareness and interest of the Norwegian people. The fact that the Nobel peace prize has twice been awarded to the High Commissioner for refugee organizations also speaks for itself. After the Russian revolution and its suppression in 1905 a small wave of emigrants came to Norway, and likewise after the 1917 revolution. Moreover we note a very limited and controlled immigration of victims of Nazi oppression from Germany and the occupied territories until World War II. After the war Norway was faced with a series of problems in connection with the refugees. In the first place it was a question of repatriation of Norwegian prisoners in Germany and refugees in Sweden, there were the forced evacuees from Finmark to be sent home, and then, last but not least, all the foreigners who had involuntarily landed in Norway during the war. Of these 140,000 were “displaced persons“. These had been brought to the country by the Germans either as civil workers or forced labourers in “Organization Todt”, “Organization Speer” or as prisoners of war, mainly Serbs (Jugoslavs), Russians and Poles. According to a list published in the annual report of the Ministry of Labour for 1947 (1948) the following figures are given: