Some trapped miners in ‘bad emotional shape’

“This was so beautiful,we hadn’t seen him since he left the house,” said Bélgica Ramírez,59,a sister-in-law of Mario Gomes,one of the miners. “But he seems to have deteriorated so much; he’s so thin,he needs to eat.”

The video showed most of them in good spirits,and,though they had lost considerable weight,were in reasonably good health.

Yet Dr Jaime Mañalich,Chile’s Health Minister,said that the video also showed that five of the miners were “in very bad emotional shape”. Dr Mañalich said psychiatrists on the surface would engage in short therapy sessions with each of the five men,before prescribing medication.

Dr Mañalich said that the miners were in a “euphoric” mood after crews on the surface bored down to them on Sunday,finding that all 33 were alive after 17 days without contact with the outside world. “But we are prepared for them to behave in a completely different mood in the next few weeks,” he added.

A miner,his face weary and sad,salutes his family. “Thanks for everything,” he says,his voice cracking. Dr Mañalich said that health workers had met relatives on Thursday to watch the video and to discuss anything that might be different about the trapped men. He noted that the miners who appeared to be depressed were “older than the average”