The Ashanti Regional Coordinator of Mental Health Authority, Faustina Nuako, has urged Ghanaians to desist from stigmatising persons with disability since it is punishable by law.
According to her, the use of the word ‘madness’ to describe persons suffering from mental challenges, is a violation of theMental Health Act.
She explained, whilst speaking on Kumasi based Fox FM recently, that the law seeks to curb the stigma attached to the mental disease in Ghana, adding that The Mental Health Act has stated unequivocally that anyone who calls someone a mad person should be subjected to the dictates of the act.
This law, she noted, came to fore after it became a Legislative Instrument (L.I) and seeks to stop the inhumane ways under which mentally challenged patients are subjected to in Ghana.
According to FaustinaNuako, per Act 846 section 94 of the Mental Health Act, anybody who deliberately neglects a person with mental disorder or subjects a person with mental disorder to discrimination under section 54; or breaches other rights of the person, commits an offence and is liable on summary conviction to a fine of not more than five hundred penalty units or to a term of imprisonment of not more than two years or to both the fine and imprisonment.
She further explained that application of Act 95 (1) binds the Republic and applies to any place where a person with mental disorder is kept including public and private mental health facilities which shall be licensed under the Health Institutions and Facilities Act 2011, (Act 829) and any other law.
“The provisions of this Act shall apply to a person with any degree of mental disorder including mental retardation but excluding personality disorders”, she added.
According to her, per the Mental Health Act, the drugs are supposed to be free, but they are not getting them.
Recently they took delivery of some of them, but they do not last long. Some of the patients’ condition exacerbate, after their inability to continue their medication so they appear on the street.
Demystifying spiritualization of mental challenge in Ghanaian society, Mad. FaustinaNuako explained that people claim they are under spiritual attack, but when they take the drugs doctors have given them, they become okay, however, their drugs are not covered by the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS), and this is a challenge.
She noted: “Most of our patients are not working and some of their drugs are expensive.
Government should make their drugs so free because Mental Health drugs are free.”
A worried Nuakodisclosed that when the person visits the hospital and his or her time is up for revisit, the patient relaxes and their condition could worse off, with some of them appearing on the streets.
She argued that “had they been on NHIS, they could have come to hospital and take their drugs like patients of diabetes, there is no provision of that sort. When the patients report to hospital, we diagnose and give them drugs, but when they are done with their drugs, they are unable to come to the hospital to continue their treatment and this causes the resurgence of the disease.
On her part, Madam Akua Afriyie Addai, Clinical Psychologist at the Counselling Sector of the KNUST hospital explained that the word madness is one of the main reasons people are shying away from seeking medical help when they have behavioral challenges because they feel stigmatised at the mention of the word ‘mad’.
The Clinical psychologist posited that Ghanaian have a notion that when someone is diagnosed with a mental challenge, it means that person is mad, but that is not the case at all. The madness is real, but they are few. “People’s personality changes in the sense that they experience mood swings,which affects their relationships with others.”
Madam AkuaAfriyieAddai indicated that sometimes a patient will come and upon interrogation the patient will disclose that he or she has lost appetite, cannot perform duties, feeling so sad, or experiencing anxiety – All these are mental health issues,but it does not mean one is mad.
According to her, as a society we feel that when we say someone is mentally deranged it is all about madness,but that is far from it. Schizophrenia and bipolar are just minutes of mental challenges.
“Someone may look all right, but the person may be battling issues, which could result in insomnia,fatigue, loss of appetite, sluggish and reserved lifestyle,change of relationship towards relatives and loved ones”, Madam AkuaAfriyie.
The post Stigmatising mentally challenged patient is punishable by law –Experts appeared first on The Chronicle Online.
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