The importance of mental health

JUNE is Men’s Mental Health Awareness month.
This annual observance encourages men and boys to be proactive in their health by implementing mentally healthy living decisions.
Mental health is a state of well-being that enables people to cope with the stresses of life, realise their abilities, learn well and work well, and contribute to their community.
Good mental health has intrinsic and instrumental value and is integral for a person’s well-being.
It is an integral component of a person’s health and well-being that underpins our individual and collective abilities to make decisions, build relationships and shape the world we live in.
Mental health is a basic human right and it is crucial to personal, community and the overall socio-economic development of the country.
In PNG, mental health services are severely lacking with many traditional beliefs about mental illnesses, such as sorcery, hindering most patients from accessing services or adhering to the treatment prescribed.
Inadequate road network means that patients who need referral to the country’s largest mental health facility, Laloki Psychiatric Hospital, are not held in hospitals or other health facilities but in local police cells.
The challenges also include a shortage of trained staff, frequent shortages of basic psychiatric drugs, the absence of in-patient facilities at the provincial level and mental health patients in the community are mostly looked after by their families.
There has also been an increase in substance abuse, especially with cannabis (marijuana), which grows abundantly in many parts of the country.
The number of patients with cannabis-related psychosis has risen greatly over the years as the cultivation of the plant has increased, both for local consumption and as a cash crop to be smuggled and sold within and out of the country.
PNG does not, not yet at least, have a problem with hard drugs.
However, recent headlines of people found in possession of methamphetamine (crystal meth) and its implements, paint a grim picture of the country’s future.
Heroin, cocaine, opium, crystal meth and fentanyl, are very addictive and cheap substances that can easily enter our borders.
There is no denying that drug abuse leads to public disorder, road accidents, domestic violence, rape, including mental health problems.
All this needs to be properly addressed by the relevant authorities before it is too late.
PNG’s mental health legislation dates back to the Insanity Ordinance of 1912.
Superseded by other legislations, the current Mental Health Act 2015, established a Directorate for Social Change and Mental Health Services (DSCMH), including a director, board, fund and a Mental Health Tribunal.
This was an important reform in the health sector to help ensure mental health services are expanded and improved.
The law also addressed voluntary and involuntary patient admission, processes for treatment, discharge of patients, rights and freedoms of inpatients, protection of patients from abuse and neglect and the management of people with mental illness in the justice system.
However, there are no provisions regarding children or adolescents in the 24-page legislation.
Mental health services need to be improved and easily accessed at the provincial and district levels.
The capacity of mental health workers need to be improved to support and maintain patient care and rehabilitation.
The recent landslide in Enga and devastation that plagued the people physically, also highlighted the need for mental health services.
The amount of violence, trauma, depression and tendency for suicide experienced by many Papua New Guineans usually goes unnoticed and untreated.
Only earlier this month did the Laloki Psychiatric Hospital have its proper management reinstated after the DSCMH was given the all-clear to develop the hospital after a one-year legal battle over management issues.
The hospital has a 60-bed capacity will be undergoing a major facelift this year.
Apart from the development of the hospital, the following strategies, among others, need to be implemented to improve mental health services in the
country:

• PSYCHIATRIC care, treatment and counselling should be free of charge for all;
• LALOKI Psychiatric Hospital should remain the national referral centre with adequate support given by the Government; and
• REFERRAL and supervising units for mental health patients should be established in the four regions of the country.

This can only be done with support from the Government, through the Health Department.
The Health Department and DSCMH should collaborate to ensure that all mental health reforms are equitable and sustainable.
Affordable, effective and feasible strategies need to be implemented to improve mental health services in the country.
Better mental health services are essential for every person that needs it in PNG.