Eastern Cape officials have embarked on a clean-up campaign of a different kind; admitting homeless people to mental institutions.
A group of 25 people was admitted to Fort England mental hospital in Grahamstown, following a decision to remove mentally ill people from the streets and place them in psychiatric hospitals.
A team of doctors reviewed the patients and found them to be neither mentally ill nor certifiable in terms of the Mental Health Act.
Earlier this week the Bisho High Court ordered the release of 11 of the 25 people.
However instead of releasing the individuals, officials admitted them to the Tower Hospital in Fort Beaufort. Provincial health spokesperson Sizwe Kupelo said the order meant only that they could not be involuntarily detained.
However, he said they had then been immediately transferred to Tower Hospital as ”voluntary patients”.
Dave Swingler of Fort England Psychiatric Hospital has sharply criticised the move to round up allegedly mentally ill people and ship them to institutions.
In a letter to provincial health officials, Swingler described the campaign as ”an indictment of the mismanagement of the district health system in the area, a disservice to our people and flagrant human rights abuse”.
He said poverty and homelessness were not mental illnesses and their solution was ”certainly not involuntary incarceration in a specialist psychiatric hospital”.
However, Kupelo said the ”clean-up” campaign was clearly a success and would continue for the envisaged six-month period. – Sapa