Has anyone else ever noticed the amount of mentally ill people running in the streets in Nigeria? I would like to blame this on the lack-of-knowledge and money that the government uses to support homeless people in general , until I realize that many of these people are not born homeless, but are the children on middle class people! There are people that actually abandon their children or let them run away due to the embarrassment they feel having them around. It also may be due to the financial pressures of raising such a child in a country like Nigeria, but I still can't understand how such a thing could still be done in these times? And why is there no focus on control and treatment of the physically and mentally impaired in Nigeria?, since it is an obviously prevalent problem in our country. I also find that people are more reluctant to adopt, marry, or even associate with one that may have a mentally or physically impaired family member, even if the disability has been proven to not be genetically spread. In a country that values family as much as ours, how can this continue?

An overly illiterate nation that still believes in jujus and superstition will stigmatise the diseases as some sort ot spiritual attack by the families enemies or something like that. There are many people in developed countries who are suffering from this ailments and are able to leave relatively productive and happy lives with aid of medicatin and other forms of management.

I wonder how the medication drives away the spirit that is attacking them? Hmmmm

Anyways this ailment attacks about 1% of the nigerian population which means about 14 million naijas do suffer from this ailment in many forms from acute to chronic. Their recovery is based on viogourous rehabilitation once the onset of the illness is detected, otherwise the individual becomes worse as time goes on.

THe illness is a result of a combination of genetic and enviromental factors. Most occurences in developing countries and linked to drug abuse and trauma from childhood. Your job is to pass the knowledge on to people because the worst disease any one of us can suffer from is IGNORANCE.

serious problem even on nl

Definitely agree.more resources need to be allocated towards this special population especially at the secondary and tertiary levels.