The commissioner of parliament ,Rt Hon. Mathias Mpuuga Nsamba has urged government to mainstream mental health issues in all sectors and activities of government, saying that such an approach will help to reduce the growing number of mental health cases in the country.
Mpuuga made the remarks today while officiating mental health awareness camp at parliament.
He however lauded the government’s efforts in ensuring that there is adequate HIV/AIDS medicine to it’s beneficiaries in government facilities, which he said has played a big role in reducing its spread.
“We have tried to check I’ve been doing a lot of over sight work in health centres level 1, 2, 3 and they all had the stocks, so why do we have drugs for mental health run out. I think it’s because we’ve not mainstreamed it. I think that’s the main challenge for us as key stakeholders where we have to react to this challenge” He said
Mpuuga revealed that one of the biggest approaches that curtailed HIV/AIDs was mainstreaming it in all sectors and activities across the country. And here we are we can witness a reduction in the spread of HIV/AIDs in this country. “Is it impossible to also mainstream mental health from what we do, in government departments, in private sectors. I think this where this invitation is taking us to.” Mpuuga said
It’s upon the above context that he called on the responsible parties to take charge of the move to mainstream mental health in all government work. “We are parliament and what we cannot do is to create a human being but parliament can do anything that can change trajectory of events in this country. Once we pronounce it they will have to do it that’s what we have to do as legislators.” He said
Meanwhile the deputy Director of Butabika Mental health Hospital Dr Byamah Mutamba raised a red flag on the growing population of mental patients in Butabika, without a corresponding budget to handle the challenge.
He also lauded the members of parliament for being a strong advocate not only health facilities in the country but specifically Butabika hospital. “You’ve heard about the services we do as a national referral hospital. We are not only a referral hospital but also a research hospital. We need a lot of support to improve health services, not only as a hospital where we already oversubscribed but also use our mandate to improve services at primary healthcare and community level.” Dr Byamah said
He added and said that if the country had a lot of mental health services integrated at primary healthcare and community level, there wouldn’t have been so many questions at Butabika hence enabling them to provide better quality healthcare at the facility. “We actually want to go as far as asking that every organisation has a budget life for mental health, because there isn’t any health without mental health, so we really appreciate parliament.” He said
