Residents of Accra Psychiatric Hospital staff quarters asked to move out
Residents of the Accra Psychiatric Hospital (APH) staff quarters have been asked to vacate the accommodation by June this year.
A letter to the staff, signed by the Director of the Hospital, Dr Pinaman Appau, said the decision was to pave way for the redevelopment of the Hospital under Agenda 111 project.
The letter, dated January 14, 2022, said: “As discussed at the meeting with you on November 5, 2021, we wish to inform you that the planned reconstruction of the Hospital will take off in June 2022.”
When the Ghana News Agency visited the Hospital Thursday morning, it observed that it’s Outpatient Department (OPD) was busy.
A staff, who spoke to the GNA on anonymity, alleged that the authorities had since last year asked them (staff) to seek transfer to other health facilities.
“A transfer book has been opened and people are panicking,” he said.
She told the GNA that more than half of the nurses at the Hospital had left for other health facilities.
There are media reports that the APH had been sold to a private developer but the Health Minister, Mr Kwaku Agyemang-Manu, in a Facebook post dismissed the reports.
“The APH is to be redeveloped into a 220-bed psychiatric hospital under an Engineering, Procurement and Construction (EDC) contract as part of Agenda 111,” he said.
The government under the Agenda 111 seeks to redevelop the Accra Psychiatric Hospital, construct, equip and commission two additional psychiatric hospitals, one in Kumasi and another at Tamale.
The Chairman of the Parliamentary Select committee on Health, Dr Nana Ayew Afriye, after an interaction with the Management of the Hospital, told the media that the facility was not for sale, however, portions of the land would be commercialised under the Agenda 111 project.
He said the part of the land to be commercialised would be opened to Public Private Partnerships (PPP) in due time to minimise the financial burden on the Hospital.
The Accra Psychiatric Hospital, formally the Lunatic Asylum, was constructed in 1904 for the treatment, welfare, training, and rehabilitation of persons with mental illness.
Source: GNA