As a way of showing empathy to the mental challenges faced by many Nigerians during the outbreak of the pandemic across the country, I came up with this piece which was aimed at motivating the key stakeholders of mental health on the need to improve the condition of mental health in Nigeria using the powers of legislation .This essay was written on September 4, 2020 in commemoration of the World Mental Health which is celebrated on October 10 of every year. Below is the full essay which I came up with during the outbreak of the pandemic as a form of solidarity to the plight of many Nigerians affected:
The outbreak of Covid-19 pandemic has not only challenged the global health system but has also tested the spirit of humanity.Covid-19 has deepened economic and social stress of the world order which has resulted to restricted movements and social isolation measures. The pandemic has further amplified the context of fragility, conflict, and emergencies where social cohesion is already undermined and institutional capacity and services are largely limited. As a result, a major fall out of the pandemic is on mental health care. As stated on the National Policy for Mental Health Services Delivery in Nigeria (2013), mental health is an inalienable right of every Nigerian and mental health care shall be made available to all citizens within the national health system at primary health care and in communities. The mental health service delivery in Nigeria is in a state of comatose because the mental health infrastructure of the country is currently being governed by a framework dated back to 1916. It is saddening to note that the status of mental health has worsened with the outbreak of the pandemic across the globe.
Desperate times indeed calls for desperate measures, the pandemic has necessitated the need to embark on urgent steps to address mental health issues in Nigeria. This can only be made possible if the right policies and legislations are put in place to halt it upsurge. There is an ongoing effort to provide a legislation on mental health in country. In 2019, the Senate passed the Mental Health Bill for second reading which has scaled up to public hearing as at February 2020. With the outbreak of the pandemic, the national Assembly must pay huge attention to the bill in order to halt the upsurge of mental health during this period where socio-economic conditions have been affected severely. This legislation must provide quality infrastructure for mental health care, adequate budgetary allocation to mental health care, amplify on community based approach to improve on the facilities of mental health care, solidify on adequate and skilled man power to improve on the state of the mental health service delivery, encourage social rehabilitation measures by incorporating Persons With Disabilities in the process and most significantly, enhance public knowledge on mental health. These and many more are the potential roles that the legislation lying before the national assembly can play to survive the upsurge of the pandemic in Nigeria.
To sum up, the United Nations Organization has recently issued a strong warning to the international community on the need to urgently put in place measures to protect those suffering from the increased mental vulnerabilities during this period. Mental health indeed constitutes a vital part of national development, hence, the passage of legislations and policies on mental health is a step in the right direction that seeks to address a great disaster influenced by the pandemic. Indeed, a stitch in time says nine!
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