CHONGQING, April 1 (Xinhuanet) -- Survivors and family members of victims from a fatal gas blowout in southwest China's Chongqing city, at the end of last year, have recently received psychological comfort and risk intervention services.

    Among the worst industry-related disaster ever in the country, the accident, dubbed "12/23" after the date when it happened, caused a gas well to blow out, spewing a poisonous mix of natural gas and hydrogen sulfide over mountainous Kaixian County of Chongqing as villagers were sleeping. The victims were asphyxiatedor suffered rashes and burns.

    The death toll of the disaster reached 243.

    All the victims and family members of the people killed in the gas blowout have been compensated financially. Yet the survivors remained affected both physically and mentally in villages around the accident site.

    The Chongqing-based New Thought Counseling Firm conducted a questionnaire survey of about 300 people in six villages in the county, and found that the majority of the villagers investigated were suffering a sort of post-traumatic stress syndrome to different degrees.

    According to Ji Chuan, a counselor from the New Thought firm, most of the disaster survivors suffered anorexia, insomnia, chest distress, headache, dizziness and hypodynamia. Depressed and nervous, they were easily irritated and lacked a sense of security.

    Still haunted by the bitter memory of the gas blowout even after three months, the survivors and family members of the victims continue to fear approaching the accident site.

    To this end, counselors provided a psychotherapy for the villagers to help them resume confidence in their future life.

    The professionals from the firm also suggested when the residents in Kaixian, who were evacuated upon the gas blowout, go back home, they should be provided with risk intervention services,so as to mitigate their anxiety.

    In 2002, risk intervention was first exercised for family members and friends of those died in major disasters on the Chinese mainland, after an aircraft crash killed 103 passengers and a crew of nine on May 7 that year in Dalian, northeast China'sLiaoning Province.

    The event aroused concern about mental health care for survivors of serious disasters in China. Enditem