Chief Psychiatrist calls for mental health law

Saturday, September 12, 2009 (The Mirror Pg 34)

By Rebecca Kwei
The Chief Psychiatrist, Dr Akwasi Osei, says there is an urgent need for the Mental Health Bill to be passed into law since it will protect the rights of people.
He noted that mental health borders mainly on human rights and the law will prevent people from being abused.
“Every day that the bill is delayed, somebody’s right is being abused and the country loses resources,” he said.
Dr Osei was speaking at a day’s workshop for reporters on the Mental Health Bill in Ghana. The workshop was organised by BasicNeeds, an NGO that seeks to bring change in the lives of people with mental illness or epilepsy and their families.
According to Dr Osei, the bill, which has been revised many times and currently with the Attorney General, has nine sections, including a Mental Health Board to oversee the implementation of the law.
There is also a Mental Health Service, which will be separate from the Ghana Health Service, making it autonomous, but will collaborate with the general health system.
Other sections are the Mental Health Review Tribunal to rule on abuse of rights of patients; Visiting Committees to ensure that the right things are being done; Voluntary and Involuntary treatment; Rights of persons with mental disorder and Protection of Vulnerable groups.
Dr Osei said the Mental Health Bill would de-emphasise institutional care and emphasise community care, making mental care cheaper.
He said the bill had gone through a lot of consultation and the World Health Organisation would likely use it as a template for Gambia.
A Psychiatrist Consultant, Dr J. B. Asare, who presented a paper on “A justification for a separate Mental Health Service with an authority”, said the bill sought to improve the care of the mentally ill in the country.
Additionally, it would address the decentralisation of mental health care at community and in spiritual and traditional settings.
Dr Asare said mental health would be much visible and better funded, if it was established as an authority.
On why the bill, which was drafted in 2004, was still in the offing, he said among others that there was lack of interest in mental health by policy makers and very little consideration was given to mental health during health sector reforms.
For his part, a Health Management Consultant, Dr Kofi Ahmed, said an independent Mental Health Law was needed because mentally ill persons, in most cases, could not control themselves and so were regarded as people who needed special attention.
Giving a historical perspective of the Bill, he said in 1888, the colonial government passed the first legislative instrument, the Lunatic Asylum Ordinance, Cap 79.
The Ordinance remained in force with little amendment until 1972, when the Mental Health Decree, NRCD 30, now Mental Health Act, 1972, was introduced.
A representative of the Human Rights Advocacy Centre (HRAC), Ms Maria Amanor-Akrofi, said people with mental disabilities experienced some of the harshest conditions of living that existed in any society.
Most of the hardships, she noted, were caused by discrimination and the absence of legal protection against improper and abusive treatment.
The Director, Legal Services of the Attorney General’s Department, Mrs Estella Appiah, who chaired the function, said everyone had a role to play in the passage of the bill and appealed to journalists not to stigmatise by using words such as ‘mad’ or ‘lunatics’ for mentally ill persons.
Mr Humphrey Kofie of BasicNeeds also appealed to media practitioners to continue advocating the passage of the mental health bill into law since the country stood to gain a lot from it.