by SARAH TUMWEBAZE
Patients take time off under one of Butabika Hospital’s shades recently. IMAGE/Yusuf Muziransa
On March 21, Sarah Musiwa was admitted to Butabika Hospital for the mentally ill on recommendation by the police after she allegedly killed a five-year-old boy. She escaped from her asylum and in a repeat of a heinous crime, she allegedly killed another three-year-old girl last week using a knife.
Unfortunately for her this time, a mob waylaid her and lynched her. After the first killing, the police believed her to have a mental problem and referred her to Butabika for treatment. Musiwa represents a growing case of mentally ill persons in Uganda; some so obvious and visible but majority of cases are subtle with patients scattered in workplaces, in families or schools like time bombs waiting to explode.
On Kampala streets, onlookers make such comments like: “Those are mad people, and how can you talk to people who are not paying you any attention?” in reference to street preachers who hardly have an audience listening to them.
Common problem
Dr David Basangwa, a senior consultant psychiatrist and also the deputy executive director of Butabika Hospital, says mental illness which is the condition that disrupts a person’s thinking, feelings, mood, ability to relate to others and daily functioning is becoming a common problem in Uganda and globally.
The World Health Organisation estimates that by 2020, mental disorders will be the second most diagnosed and recognised illness second only to cardiovascular diseases. In Uganda, the estimate is that 20 to 30 per cent of the population suffers from one form or the other of psychological or mental illness. However, even in the most seemingly obvious cases of the disorder, police and other institutions of health do not seem to have the capacity to detect patients.
In the case of Musiwa, it is said she confessed killing her first victim and told the police she would repeat the act if she is released. She was referred to Butabika for diagnosis and treatment in March but last week she fulfilled her ‘promise’ before she got killed by a mob, itself a possible case of a ‘collective mental disorder’.
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