CAIRO: Doctors and nurses from the Abbaseyya Psychiatric Hospital held a demonstration on Sunday amid rumors that the hospital will be relocated 80 km outside of Cairo.
Two weeks ago, independent daily Al-Dostor quoted government sources as having said that there is currently a plan to remove the psychiatric hospital from its current location in Cairo to make way for an expansion of the neighboring Cairo Exhibition Center — part of a plan referred to as “Cairo Expo.”.
Protesting doctors and nurses told Daily News Egypt that they are concerned that the government has not categorically denied the rumor. In statements to On Tv’s “Baladna Bel Masry,” Health Minister Hatem El-Gabali said that the Ministry of Health has not “received an official request” that the hospital be moved.
President of the Egyptian Psychiatric Association Ahmed Okasha described the campaign that activists initiated after rumors of the move first began circulating as a “pre-emptive strike.”
“Exactly like in war, we don’t wait until we’re attacked.” Okasha said. “We understand how the government and the ruling party work. We understand them very well.”
This sentiment was echoed by Mohamed Hassan Khalil, a member of the Committee for the Defense of the Right to Health, who said that the Ministry of Health operates according to a familiar pattern.
According to Khalil, the process usually follows this model: The Ministry of Health begins with a rumor, then it casually announces the rumor, and then it executes the decision and says, “we’ve already announced this.”
Founded in 1883, the Abbaseyya Psychiatric Hospital offers 2,000 inpatient beds, treats approximately 80,000 outpatients each year, and is the only facility in Egypt to offer training in psychiatric nursing.
The authorities reportedly plan to relocate the Abbaseyya Psychiatric Hospital to El-Badr City, located 80 km outside of Cairo, and will construct six smaller-sized hospitals within Cairo’s city limits.
Abbaseyya psychiatrist Ahmad Eid Al-Ajhuri questioned where the Ministry of Health will find the space to build new hospitals within Cairo, given that the only spaces available are generally located in satellite cities like Sixth of October City.
According to Al-Ajhuri, requiring patients to travel long distances in order to reach psychiatric hospitals goes against rules set forth by the World Health Association that state that psychiatric patients must not spend more than 20 minutes to reach a hospital. The reasoning behind this rule is that, when patients are admitted to psychiatric facilities, they frequently suffer from what is known as an “admission crisis” due to various factors, such as their separation from loved ones.
Furthermore, current approaches to psychiatric treatment and therapy promote the concept that patients should be allowed to leave the hospital for a certain amount of time each day. While the Abbaseyya Psychiatric Hospital’s current location near a park and other facilities allow this temporary leave from the hospital to take place, Al-Ajhuri says that such leave would be impossible if the hospital were transferred to a location 80 km outside of Cairo that currently lacks the necessary infrastructure and recreational facilities.
Head nurse Khaireyya Soleiman questioned why, if the hospital is to be relocated in the interests of “investors,” that the investors “do not themselves go somewhere in the desert and build their exhibition center.”
“I’ve been at Abbaseyya [Psychiatric Hospital] for 39 years,” said Soleiman. “I’ve got one year and seven months left until I retire. How am I meant to go to El-Badr? We have young nurses here earning modest wages. How are they meant to pay to get there? How will a nurse have time to take her children to school in the morning and go home and prepare them food in the evening?”
Okasha warned that moving the hospital to an isolated area will “increase the stigma associated with mental illness.”
“It should be understood that we are violating the [mental health law] produced by the National Democratic Party last year,” said Okasha. “We are marginalizing the mental patient, putting him in the desert with no transport.
“I say we can measure the culture and civilization of any country not through its economic power, not through its military power, [and] not through its political power, but [rather] through its care of the weak person — the child and the mental patient,” Okasha added.
While Okasha stated that he has received assurances from the vice-director of the People’s Assembly’s Health Committee Shereen Ahmed Fouad that “the whole parliament will be with him” in “protecting the poor,” Okasha expressed concern that “the committee is only [comprised of] 25 to 30 people, and the ruling party has a majority in parliament.”
Khalil alleged that during El-Gabali’s tenure as health minister, Egypt’s public health system has fallen victim to under-funding and downgrading as part of the government’s long-term aim of “privatizing the health system.”
Khalil pointed to the government’s decision earlier this year to turn 397 rural integrated hospitals into outpatient family health clinics, as a result of which 9,000 of the Ministry of Health’s 110,000 beds were lost, he says.
“[Land owned by the Ministry of Health, located] in special areas downtown or [along] the Nile [River], are looked upon not as good land for people to offer medical services, but as a good chance for investors and an opportunity to build malls and luxurious flats for rich people,” said Khalil. “We see this as part of a policy [to privatize] health.”
