‘Mental illness has nothing to do with witchcraft’

Sat, 03 Dec 2016 10:51:54 +0000

A MENTAL health expert on the Copperbelt says patients suffering from mental illness should not be discriminated in the communities they lived. Mr Richard Changwe further cautioned people not to associate mental illness with witchcraft because it was just a disease like any other which was curable. He told the Daily Nation that mental patients should be given an opportunity to be taken care of by their respective communities and families for them to feel part of society.

Mr Changwe said Zambia was facing numerous challenges of mental illness because most of the mental patients in Zambia were abandoned by their communities. He said it was unfortunate that people suffering from mental illness were neglected by their family members and other community members who did not understand the disease.

Mr Changwe said that it was sad that there were few mental facilities in the northern region  except for one in Ndola. He said Muchinga, Luapula and North-Western provinces depended on the mental hospital in Ndola. Mr Changwe said the Government should build mental facilities in each and every district of the country for the good of the mental patients. He said if the Government invested much of its resources in uplifting the welfare of  mental patients, mental diseases would drastically reduce in Zambia.