Alex Segbefia, Minister of Health
Scores of mental patients who visited the Accra Psychiatric Hospital to seek medical attention since Wednesday were refused access because of funding.
The managers of the facility announced suspension to new admission due to lack of funds and logistic to cater for patients.
The patients were found stranded with frustrations written on their faces.
The neglect of the psychiatric hospitals was coming at the time the Mahama administration promises to build two new facilities in the northern sector of the country.
Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Mental Health Authority, Dr Akwesi Osei, said his outfit was expected to coordinate the operations of the facility, but they are helpless.
He accused the government of failing to prioritise mental healthcare.
“We have been in touch with the ministry, we are looking at how the issue can be resolved, the truth, however, is that until they get funding, they are frankly not in a position to operate… The authority itself does not have the funding to give them. The funding has to come from the ministry,” he said.
No A-4 Sheet
The dire situation at the Accra Psychiatric Hospital has deteriorated to the point where the facility does not even have access to basic items such as A-4 sheets to take down minor but critical information.
A member of the Hospital’s Public Relations Unit, Edwina Ankomah, told Citi FM that the hospital is in dire need of basic things like “gloves, disinfectants, and stationery like paper.”
“Just a plain sheet – because someone will walk in and would want a medical report for school or something and we don’t have even an A-4 sheet,” she added.
OPD Shut Down
Persons who visited the Accra Psychiatric Hospital on Wednesday were turned away, and the hospital’s administrators have said they were compelled to take such a decision due to worsening financial constraints.
“The little we have, we have to have able to take care of those on the ward,” Ms Ankomah said, hence the hospital management’s decision.
She narrated that the situation “got worse in July when our suppliers decided not to supply us with anything that we needed to run the hospital. That is when it got bad.”
The hospital management is currently in talks with the Ministry of Health to try and solve the current situation.
As at now, the money that comes to the hospital, like a recent amount of GH¢ 521,000, is used to settle debts.
But since July, Ms Ankomah revealed that the hospital has been living off donations, but “how long can we survive on donations,” she asked?
Gov’t’s pledge to mental healthcare
With elections around the corner, the National Democratic Congress (NDC) administration has made some pledges to mental healthcare, despite the apparent neglect of existing ones.
The NDC in its 2016 manifesto promised to build two more psychiatric hospitals if voted into office.
President John Mahama said the NDC government would prioritise mental healthcare and ensure the strict implementation of the Mental Health Act, 2012, Act 846.
The Accra Psychiatric Hospital is not the only one under-resourced, as managers of the Pantang Hospital have similar concerns.