Some mental health practitioners have commended the federal government for signing the Mental Health Bill into law.
In separate interviews on Sunday, the experts also described the president’s action as ”a good thing that has happened to the mental health subsector”.
They said the new development was appropriate and would pave the way for the country’s mental health delivery system’s protection, growth and development.
President Muhammadu Buhari finally signed the Mental Health Bill into law harmonised by both Houses of Assembly in 2021.
A consultant neuropsychiatrist, Maymunah Kadiri, described the development as the right way to go, adding that Nigeria’s mental health delivery system now has a modern law protecting it.
”For me, the signing of the mental health bill was a great move after 65 years of using the Lunacy Act of 1958, which was not only outdated but also inhumane.
”The beauty about it is that it is now a law, and it covers a lot of objectives which include; ensuring the availability of mental health services at primary, secondary and tertiary health institutions across the country.
”So, we are now part of the global space with best global practice,” she said.
Another expert, Veronica Ezeh, expressed joy that with the mental health law, all forms of discrimination and stigmatisation against people with mental health conditions would be reduced or eliminated.
Ms Ezeh, also a psychiatric nurse with the Federal Neuro-psychiatric Hospital, Yaba, decried how and how people with mental health conditions were being treated in society before now.
According to her, people with mental health challenges have suffered a lot of dejection, denials, stigmatisation and discrimination, which were not helpful to the management and recovery from their conditions.
She added that many of them were denied access to mental health services and were rather chained and locked up or taken to prayer houses where their conditions were more complicated.
”With the mental health law, psychiatric patients now have rights and mouths to speak out and ask for their rights in case anyone encroaches on it.
”Similarly, the standard of mental health services will be spelt out, and there will be equity in the treatment of mental health patients,” she said.
Speaking, the vice-president, Association of Psychiatrists of Nigeria (APN), Veronica Nyamali, described the new National Mental Health Law as ”a right step in the right direction” because it would fine-tune operations of psychiatric services in Nigeria to the global best practices.
According to her, it is now left for all psychiatric institutions, the practitioners, the society and everybody to adjust and align with the provisions of the law.
“The new National Mental Health Law will fine-tune the psychiatric practice of the country to the global best practices, which means all the old ways of things have passed away.
”Everybody needs to align with the provisions of the law, and anyone caught still applying the old methods is either committing a crime or disobeying the law.
”Though, being a new law, people need time to get used to it – the new system,” Ms Nyamali said.
(NAN)
