Mahama hot over psychiatric nurses’ strike

President John Dramani Mahama has come under intense pressure to fix the basic logistics problem currently affecting health delivery at the Accra Psychiatric Hospital.

A cross-section of Ghanaians who spoke to Today yesterday expressed disappointment in the action of the management of the hospital by sending home over 200 patients.

That move, according to them, would have adverse effects on the nation’s quest to achieve Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) in the health sector.

The Accra Psychiatric Hospital on Tuesday, October 1, 2016 sent home patients who were still under observation at the various wards of the hospital due to government’s failure to provide the needed consumables for their treatment.

The move by the hospital, according to authorities, was to lessen the burden of the few doctors who were treating the patients at the facility, following the withdrawal of the services of nurses earlier this week.

The nurses began an indefinite strike on Monday, October 31, to protest poor working conditions at the hospital.

They also protested the shortage of basic logistics such as gloves, spirit, dressing solutions, facemasks, plaster, sterile cotton and gauze, deter and among others to carry out their duties.

However, the Mahama-led NDC government’s failure to provide basic logistic to doctors and nurses to enable them carry out their professional duties at the facility had received mixed reactions from majority of Ghanaians.

Some Ghanaians vented their anger at the manner in which the Mahama-led administration was handling the concerns raised by the nurses.

They expressed shock at the lack of logistics at the facility, coming at the time President Mahama was going round the country soliciting for votes and bragging that his administration has improved the health sector.

In an interview with Sunrise Radio in Eastern Region on Tuesday, October 1, 2016 in reaction to the nurses’ strike, President Dramani Mahama indicated that he was not aware of the strike action being embarked on by the nurses of Accra Psychiatric Hospital.

“It hasn’t come to my attention, but I do know that the area of mental health is one of the areas where we need to focus our attention [because] our psychiatrists tell us that all of us have a bit of madness in us and that somehow we all have some mental disorder or the other so it means that it is something that we need to pay attention to.

“We will take immediate steps to resolve the issue at the Accra Psychiatric Hospital and I am going to call the Minister of Health after this programme to see what the issues are and how we will resolve them,” the President assured.

But, that comment by President Dramani Mahama has since been condemned by some Ghanaians, calling on him to fix the problem now.

For instance, some residents at Avenor in Accra who spoke to Today in an interview were unhappy about government’s inability to provide logistics for the nurses and doctors at the hospital to perform their duties.

Meanwhile on social media yesterday (Twitter), President Dramani Mahama’s comment received loads of bashing.

For example, some of the tweets were; @Sambryanbuabeng “but you don’t even know the number of children you got. How will you know”, @PRGirl233, @JDMahama are you aware that 70 patients at the Accra Psychiatric Hospital share 7 towels and @KafuiDey, please sign the petition so we help get supplies for Accra Psychiatric Hospital”.

The rest were;@JustNanaAma, Nurses&doctors in Ghana don’t even have basic like gloves & detergent to work. The Hospital Accra Psychiatric is a microcosm of the problem”. @Veterans4Change, “The Accra Psychiatric Hospital is forced to discharge patients because of drug shortage Yet@JDMahama is promising new psychiatric hospitals.”