The Upper West Regional Mental Health Coordinator, Sylvester Basagnia has
observed that depression is one mental health condition that easily slips through the Out-Patients Department (OPD) at hospitals because it bears semblance with malaria in signs and symptoms.

Basagnia said this when he was interacting with students of the Simon Diedong
Dombo University of Business and Integrated Development Studies (SDD UBIDS) in Wa at a Mental Health Awareness Forum organised by the Welfare Commission of the
Students Representative Council (SRC) over the weekend.

“Depression is one condition that easily slips through OPD. When you have depression, people don’t easily notice it; they might even think that it is malaria. You talk about headache, sleeplessness, loss of appetite, loss of interest in things that you used to have interest in, and all that,” he said.

He noted that given the signs, people tend to treat malaria until the condition gets to the psychotic stage when they now realise it is a mental ill-health condition.

“We usually advise that you report early enough to give a good prognosis of the condition but if you stay till the person’s condition gets chronic, sometimes we only manage but we cannot cure this person of the illness,” he advised.

He further admonished the students against pointing discriminating fingers at persons with mental health conditions but instead to show them love and empathy as he said “mental health is no respecter of persons.”

Commenting on the repeal of the law criminalizing attempted suicide, Basagnia said it was a great step at supporting people who may be in some distressed situations and ideating suicide to come out of those situations.

“So we need to all come on board. If someone attempts suicide, it means it is a cry for help. Someone committing or attempting suicide means that the person has an issue he/she is battling with, something that the person fears more than death,” he added.

Charity Batuure, the Upper West Regional Director of the Department of Gender, speaking at the sidelines of the program, said the issue of mental health has a
strong relationship with sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV) as the latter often leads to the former.

“For us, we have linked the issue of mental health to SGBV because we know there is a strong relationship between these two.

“And for our interest in students, in their youth space, a whole lot happens in terms of relationships and with recent instances that we have a lot of intimate partner violence going on, we feel there is the need to sensitise them,” she said.

She also advised the students to watch out for signals of SGBV and mental health and to report and seek assistance where the need be.

“Sometimes, they find it difficult to even talk about it or even let the next person know what they are going through, but if they are confiding in themselves as friends, we want them to build that team so that they can take action to help each other,” she added.

Chairperson of the SRC Welfare Committee, Faustina Angkongzumah Biengu said
the forum was necessary to sensitise students to be wary of mental health issues as they go about their academic activities coupled with the tendencies to indulge in substance abuse as well as opposite-sex relationships.

“As human being, we have something we call mental illness and this mental illness is something that affects so many people that they don’t even know. And we learnt that walking on the street naked and ragged is not the only mental illness, but it does live with every person in a way,” Titus, a participant shared his experience.