Uganda: Ground Zero for Mental Health
Mental health patients receive treatment at Butabika Hospital in Kampala, Uganda.
By Rebecca Harshbarger
After a mentally-disturbed resident of Wakiso district turned himself into the Ugandan police, claiming responsibility for the destruction of Kasubi Tombs, the Ugandan press has run stories on the disturbing state of mental health in Uganda. Last summer, I attended a mental health conference in Lira with journalists Chris Conte (who organized it through the Health Communication Alliance), Lydia Namubiru, and Igor Kossov, among others, where reporters were trained in covering mental health issues.
Uganda may very well be ground zero for mental illness internationally– despite that it is a country of 33 million people, many of who have lived through several wars, there are only 28 psychiatrists (much less than Kenya’s still-anemic 80). Most Ugandans, perhaps as many as 80 percent, visit traditional healers for madness, dementia, and other problems. Egan Taboro reported on self-injury for the Daily Monitor last March, and Chris Kiwawulo took on the mental health beat in New Vision recently– check out his reporting here.
Kiwawulo says that David Basangwa, a leader on mental health in Uganda, and the senior consultant psychiatrist at Butabika Hospital, estimates that as many as 35 percent of Uganda suffer from mental illness. A study that came out in 2006 in a publication called BMC Psychiatry estimated that half of adults assessed in two districts in northern Uganda, Gulu and Amuru, suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
A mentally-ill man claimed credit for the Kasubi Tombs' fire, but police doubt his credibility.
To address the state of Uganda’s mental health, the government includes mental health services in the country’s national health budget, and added mental health units to 13 regional referral hospitals nationally. Kampala’s Butabika (a psychiatric hospital) currently serves thousands of patients a year in its 900-bed facility. Health officials hope the addition of the mental health units will decongest Butabika. Joseph Musoke, the resident of Wakiso that said he burnt down the tombs, was recently referred to Butabika for a mental checkup, but he is still a suspect in the tragic Kasubi fire.
Related Resources:
Butabika Hospital’s homepage
Mental Health Uganda, a community NGO
Ugandan Ministry of Health
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Wow!!! Finally some one is addressing Mental illness, Which is an “open secret”. The social stigma attached to Mental illness stops many to come out for help and yet I strongly agree with the title of this article. With back to back civil wars over the years and the up’s and down’s of severe poverty, indeed Uganda is fertile grounds for both Behavioral and mental health issues. Thing is, we all think that if we look the other way, it will go just go away…before we know it, the hill will be a mountain and quite not movable. Please do not stop at this article, we need stimulation and to keep the conversation going. Again thank you so much for this article, I have a soft sport for Behavioral and mental health illness, especially as I am trying to come to terms with my own mother who has a long history of mental illness but never diagnosed, knowing what I know now as a nurse, I could not be any happier that some one is seeing what I see.