Mental Health Day: Let’s fight for equality to address mental health issues- MHA
By Eric Nii Sackey
The Mental Health Authority (MHA) in collaboration with World Health Organization(WHO), Ministry of Health (MoH) and other stakeholders have held a seminar to mark the 2021 World Mental Health week campaign and dliberate on how to realign resources allocation to mental health in Accra.
Speaking to journalists on the theme: The state of mental health in Ghana: Realigning resource allocation, the Dep. Chief Executive of MHA, Dr Caroline Amissah said the negative effect of COVID-19 pandemic has worsen mental health activities causing financial difficulties in patronizing and access mental health services in the country.
” We all ready know a study on mental health has shown that lost to GPD on mental health is estimated around 7 percent making the global estimate on mental health disability quite significant”, she said.
She further recounted a Research by Figo in 2016 which suggests that global mental disorders moves around 32 percent, adding, “so people with mental health conditions we know live with such forms of disability and they do not get a perfect life”.
Also, in South Sahara Africa, mental disorders and substance abused is estimated around 19 percent per day, which is very alarming.
She again explained that a research conducted in Ghana on mental health has an unequal attention which constitutes only about 4 percent and has impacted negatively on the distribution of medicines and services to various health centre’s across the regions.
The Dep. Chief Executive expressed worry over the low rate of mental health treatment in the country because only 2 percent of persons with mental health disorders have access to treatment which must be checked and addressed with all seriousness by government and stakeholders in the sector.
” But though there’s little improvement, we also need a vibrant research that we can dwell on as evidence to ensure the best will be achieved in the fight against the inequalities for the betterment of the sector”, Dr. Amissah noted.
Panellists from various sectors in health, health institutions and the media also made presentations on how mental health sector and resources must be allocated to revamp the sector in terms of purchase of drugs and other services across the country.
Various organizations like MoH, Nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), individuals among others attended the seminar to deliberate in how to tackle the menace in mental health.
