GIZ Ghana today held a seminar to commemorate World Mental Health Day 2023.
This year’s theme, “mental health is a universal human right aims to improve knowledge,raise awareness, and drive actions that protect mental health as a human right.
The seminar brought together relevant stakeholders in Ghana’s mental health sector, including officials from the Ghana Mental Health Authority and Accra Psychiatric Hospital, to discuss challenges and how to improve access to mental health care in Ghana. Other participants included students and teachers from selected second cycle institutions, persons with disability returned migrants, and private mental health professionals and organisations,
Mental health care has become high priority for many nations, including Ghana in recent years The country has over 2.3 million people living with various mental health conditions, according to the World Health Organization. These conditions include mild, moderate and severe psychological disorders, yet mental health care remains a challenge, with a 98% treatment gap.
To complement Government of Ghana’s efforts to address the gap and improve mental health and well-being, the Ghanaian-European Centre for Jobs, Migration and Development (GEC provides mental health and psychosocial support to its clients. The Centre, which is implemente by the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ), is funded by the Germa Federal Ministry of Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) and co-funded by the European Union.
GEC’s support includes counselling, psychotherapy sessions, temporary accommodation an
healthcare for returned migrants, who suffer various mental conditions, to ensure their success reintegration. GEC also provides support to vulnerable persons including persons with disability, unemployed youth, and women.
Since 2017, GEC has supported about 3,436 persons, including 927 women. About 150 returned migrants and traditional and community leaders have also received training in basic peer
counselling.
“By encouraging and supporting returned migrants to take the lead on some of our employment promotion interventions in 16 communities in the Bono, Bono East and Ahafo regions, we not o have provided socioeconomic prospects, but we have also helped to reduce the stigma they of suffer when they return to their communities,” says Mr. Michael Kwaku Yeboah, Component Manager at the Ghanaian- European Centre for Jobs, Migration and Development. “Their involvement in these projects also speeds their reintegration into society and protects their me well-being.”
World Mental Health Day, first marked on October 10, 1992, is set aside to raise awareness of mental health issues around the world and to mobilize efforts in support of mental health. The day also provides an opportunity for all stakeholders working on mental health issues to talk about their work, and what more needs to be done to make mental health care a reality for people worldwide
