Three of the country's main public psychiatric hospitals - Accra, Pan tang and Ankaful - have been hit by an acute shortage of drugs for mental patients. Reports indicate that the hospitals have not been supplied with drugs for the past five months. Health workers at the hospitals told the Daily Graphic that the situation has caused some of the patients on admission to be given lower doses of prescribed drugs, while out-patients had to buy from outside the hospitals at exorbitant prices. Under Ghana's health sector policy, psychiatric drugs are provided free of charge by the Ministry of Health (MoH) for the treatment of patients who suffer from various types of mental illness. At worst, the drugs have to be subsidised for these patients who are considered vulnerable. A caller from the Ankaful Psychiatric Hospital who sent an SOS message through the Daily Graphic to the MoH said for more than three months now no drug had been provided to the hospital. The Chief Psychiatrist of the Ghana Health Service (GHS), Dr Akwasi Osei, who confirmed the report, said the hospitals had run out of supplies and there had been virtually no drugs for the past five months. Dr Osei, who is also the Head of the Accra Psychiatric Hospital at Asylum Down, however, expressed the hope that a meeting with the Minister of Health, Dr Benjamin Kumbour, and his deputy, Mr Robert Joseph Mettle-Nunoo, on Wednesday was likely to yield some positive results. He said some challenges that affected the supply of the drugs had been identified and were being resolved. He pointed out that there was the issue of checks and the verification of the efficacy of the drugs which partly caused the delay and stated that drugs would be sent to the hospitals as soon as possible. Dr Osei said for all that while, patients were made to purchase their own drugs, instead of being provided free under the health sector policy. He explained that as the hospitals were running out of stock, they reserved what was left for the inmates, who were at times given doses less than the required ones, and indicated that some of the inmates relied on their relations to purchase drugs for their treatment. Dr Osei appealed to those who were responsible for the supply of the drugs to expedite action, considering the peculiar situation psychiatric patients found themselves in. A Mental Health Bill intended to provide better healthcare delivery for mental patients has been on the drawing board for years. Source: Daily Graphic/Ghana