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7
Summer Acts
My Internship Experience with
the World Health Organization
WU Ka-Yan,Ellery
MSSc in Clinical Psychology, 2011
What is the World Health Organization (WHO) about? Public
health? Avian Flu? Guidelines? Developing countries? Dr.
Margaret Chan? Driven by the curiosity to know how mental
health is conceptualized in a public health perspective, I applied
for an internship with the headquarter of the WHO when I was
studying the Master of Social Science in Clinical Psychology in
CUHK. This simple curiosity created an opportunity for me to
understand this leading global public health non-government
organization that may in turn change my future career path.
I flew to Geneva in Switzerland right after the completion of
my master study and started my internship in September 2011.
During the four-month internship, I was placed in the Mental
Health Policy and Services Development Team within the
Department of Mental Health and Substance Abuse. Having
a psychologist from Australia as my supervisor, I worked with
a multi-national team on various projects related to mental
health promotion on country or global level. For example, we
researched various countries’ mental health profile, conducted
country visits (e.g. Greece) to implement a project aiming at
improving quality of mental health facilities, developed the
Global Mental Health Online Platform, drafted fund-raising
documents and researched best practices in mental health
service as part of the department’s strategic plan to improve
mental health care in the globe. These tasks are not what
a clinical psychologist would typically do in Hong Kong.
Nevertheless, these experiences opened up many possibilities
of what and how a person with clinical psychology training can
contribute to Hong Kong’s mental health. Preventive work is as
important as, if not more important than, remedial care. Mental
health service that is integrated in primary care is the world
trend and is something that is urgently needed in Hong Kong.
On top of these lessons which are greatly related to mental
health, I also learned a lot from all kind of free seminars,
lessons and workshops for staff. I had so much fun taking part
in all different kinds of activities organized by the very active
intern community in the WHO as well as the UN system. I
met some very interesting people and had some extremely
inspiring conversations with people from different professions
and from all over the world. If that is still not appealing enough,
maybe the chance of travelling around the pretty Switzerland
(also Europe) would make you start to plan seriously for your
own United Nation internship.
I still remember the words written on one of the posters in my
office in Geneva. “Those who make difficult choices in life often
make lots of mistakes. But those who avoid difficult choices
make the biggest mistake of all.” I think that is the spirit we
need to make a difference in life.
Internship in the WHO widened the horizons of Ellery. (The second right at the fifth row)
A window of the
headquarters of
WHO provides a
worldwide fascinating
view of the world.
For more information on internship opportunities in the World Health Organization, please visit www.who.int/employment/internship/en/.