Care for mental patients ‘yet to be seen’
'It remains to be seen whether all patients are properly looked after'
Although a new care centre has been established at the former Life Esidimeni mental hospital, families are still at a loss.
“The new care centre in Randfontein is a drug and alcohol rehabilitation centre, which will do little for most of the former hospital’s mentally-challenged patients,” said Jack Bloom, DA Gauteng Shadow MEC for Health. He continued, saying, “This centre is being run in partnership with the Gauteng Department of Social Development which is welcome news but many relatives of the psychiatric patients who have been relocated are unhappy about the new facilities they’ve been placed in.”
Some patients have already been placed at Weskoppies and Sterkfontein hospitals. Bloom said others had been placed at Non-governmental Organisations (NGOs) which do not appear to have staff with the necessary expertise to look after them.
“It remains to be seen whether all 2 000 patients who used to be accommodated at Esidimeni are properly looked after,” he said.
The family members of many of the mentally-ill patients held a protest in early June outside the Gauteng Health Department’s head office to voice their concerns and unhappiness about the transfers from Esidimeni.
“The Gauteng Health Department needs to monitor the facilities in which these long-term psychiatric patients have been placed, and make improvements where necessary,” Bloom concluded.
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Also read:
New care centre to be opened at former Life Esidimeni
Still no home for hundreds of psychiatric patients
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