The Greater Accra Regional Secretariat of the Ghana Tourism Association (GTA) has donated food and toiletries to the Children’s Department of the Accra Psychiatric Hospital as a sign of love to mark Valentine’s Day.
The Deputy Director of Nursing at the Accra Psychiatric Hospital, Mr. Emmanuel Pappoe, received the items, which included rice, cupcakes, cocoa drinks, Golden Tree chocolates and assorted toiletries.
Mr Obeng in an interview with GNA stated:” Today is the National Chocolate Day so we came to the Hospital to show love to the patients here by donating, especially chocolate and other cocoa products.
Research has shown the benefits of cocoa to include reduction in blood pressure and enhancement in the performance of the heart. Mr Pappoe said the Hospital was facing a number of challenges, with funding being the main one, as its subvention from the national purse was inadequate.
The patients, he said, were being given three square meals a day.
There were about 390 patients but two-thirds of the were vagrants. “The people who brought them have abandoned them and, therefore, we rely on donations made by NGOs, churches and philanthropists to run the place.
“We are trying to collect a token from the new patients; but the old ones are more than the new as 250 of them cannot go home”. However, he said, they carried out repatriation exercises for the healed patients whenever funds were available to fuel their vehicle.
They are accompanied by social welfare officers, nurses and community psychiatric nurses who hand them over to their relatives. Mr Pappoe appealed for the coverage of mentally challenged persons under the National Health Insurance Scheme, saying those who were taken ill and sent to external hospitals had to pay for their treatment since the inmates were not under the Scheme.
The Charge Nurse of the Children’s Ward, Madam Makafui Agbeko, appealed to individuals, corporate organisations and NGOs to give them adult diapers, foodstuff and toiletries.