support 1000 mental health patients in Ghana

Should one endeavor to  walk on the major cities in Ghana, the worrying sight would be to come across some individuals suffering from mental illnesses.

This phenomenon, unfortunate in nature possesses danger to the general public and as well as paints a gloomy business environment for local and foreign investors.

Because of the stigmatization and neglect associated with mental illness in Ghana and Africa as a whole, individuals are left with no other option than to sleep, eat and even bathe under bridges and are left at the mercy of the elements. As a result most of such individuals are either fierce or violent in nature just to say the least. Sometimes, the females amongst them are physically or sexually abused.

Few if not all go hungry for weeks and are at times denied basic healthcare.

In keeping to the mission and vision, staff, nurses and volunteers of MENSAH MENTAL HEALTH REHABILITATION PROJECT( MEMHREP) an NGO headquartered at Okyerekrom in the Ejisu municipality on Monday 17th April 2022 embarked on an outreach to feed and clothed persons with mental health conditions in the communities.

The staffs who were branded with the organisation's logo embossed on white and yellow shirts began the activity at around 12pm.

The teams first stop was at the overhead bridge located at Asafo Interchange, a suburb of Kumasi.  About 50 people were fed with various traditional delicacies such as banku with fish, rich and stew, yams with egg stew, just to mention a few. Soft drinks and biscuits were not left out. It’s happy to note the general public (bystanders and onlookers) were very impressed with the NGO's benevolence and took tends to interact with their staff.

One young beneficiary though gave way to tears stating that he was shocked to have people think about them and pleaded that the organisation come and feed them daily.

Beaming with smiles, the walked from Asafo to Adum distributing food items and engaging the general public on how best to address the issues of mental health in Ghana. The team also educated the general public not to discriminate or stigmatize against persons live with mental health or physical disabilities. Notes were taken by the team about their essential needs and challenges they face daily. About 200 people were fed in Adum and Kejetia.

Surprisingly, some of the females were with kids, who were out of school, malnutritioned, resulting from societal neglect and attention.

The outreach team met its goals by reaching out to about 500 persons living with mental health conditions, various vulnerabilities and physical disabilities.

"The experience, satisfaction and sense of duty will be forever written in gold on my heart" said by Mr Joel Justin one of the new volunteers of MEMHREP, after the day’s activities.

Part of MEMHREP GH  vision and mission is to establish perhaps the largest ultramodern state of the art rehabilitation on an already acquired land in in middle belt of Ghana, precisely Effiduase-Asokore district in Ashanti Region. Under this project,  individuals with mental  health conditions and disabilities would be taking out of the streets, giving proper healthcare, resettlement plans (including training and apprenticeship)
and thereafter integrated  into society.

MEMHREP would want to appeal to individuals,opinion leaders, corporate institutions, the religious bodies and government agencies to assist financially and materially to complete this project.