The government has promised to release funds to the three major Psychiatric hospitals by Friday.
The commitment follows a threat issued by the Acting Clinical Coordinator of the Ankaful Psychiatric Hospital, Dr. Emefa Dadzie that the hospital would be compelled to release mental health patients onto the streets if the government continued to drag its feet in releasing funding for the running of the facility.
Speaking to the media when the Church of Later-Day Saints donated some items to the hospital at Cape Coast, Dr. Dadzie lamented how difficult it has become for the hospital to procure foodstuff to feed the inmate.
She said the facility is so indebted to its creditors that they are no longer willing to supply the hospital with foodstuffs.
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“First of all, feeding the patients, taking care of patients, is becoming a very great burden to us. Even recently, we had to scramble together to get money to buy a meal for a day for the patients because we are not getting the funds from government as we need to. They promised us from the beginning of the year till now.
Even the little money they promised to give us, we’ve still not received it yet so we are having difficulties,” Dr. Emefa Dadzie lamented.
She further stated that government has reneged on its earlier promise to release funds to the hospital, resulting in the complexity of the situation.
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“We owe suppliers backlog of years and they are not willing to supply again so it’s becoming very difficult. Looking in the near future, maybe, we will have to maybe let all the patients go home because we can’t afford to feed them. We can’t afford to take care of them. I’m not sure how much exactly is in the budget for us but what I know is that, we went there, they promised us an amount of money. Even though it is a very small amount as compared to what we need to pay back all our creditors, even that small amount has still not come,” she cried.
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However, Public Relations Officer of the Ministry of Health, Robert Coudjoe has blamed the hospital authorities for delaying in forwarding the relevant document to the Ministry for the funds to be released to them.
Mr. Robert Coudjoe admitted that the hospital is grappling with financial challenges, but also accused the media of exaggerating the issues. He said the Accra Psychiatric, Ankaful and Pantang hospitals will be receiving their funding by Friday.