IRC inmates’ mental health problem reaches Congress
Official request for intervention of both the Senate and the Lower House is underway relative to the mis-events hounding the Iloilo Rehabilitation Center (IRC).
Subject of Resolution No. 2009-136, principal author was First District Board Member Macario Napulan, chair of the Committee on Health and Sanitation,
The move was prompted by recent disturbing reports on the medical and health condition of the IRC inmates under official custody of the Iloilo Provincial Government.
Napulan was earlier joined by fellow First District Board Member Richard Garin in seeking answers to the series of IRC management problems.
Garin’s speech called on “respecting the state of the inmates” while Napulan aired concerns on the illnesses that beset numerous detainees.
With the Committee on Health conducting its probe, the Garin-led Committee on Public Order and Security likewise launched series of meetings all geared towards finding resolution on the IRC concern.
Napulan’s latest move for Senate and Congressional intervention came amidst the official report of the IRC warden that disclosed diagnosis of inmates with psychiatric problems.
Napulan called the report “alarming” considering that 49 inmates were confirmed to be suffering from schizophrenia and other related mental problems.
The mental disorder, Resolution No. 2009-136 cited, developed among the inmates “only during their confinement at the IRC and not prior to their imprisonment…”
The affected inmates, the Resolution further noted, “should be accorded appropriate mental care and treatment which can be made available only in appropriate mental institutions provided by the government rather than be penalized and remain imprisoned. They should be treated not as ordinary prisoners but as mental patients. However, the provincial government presently is not in the position, financially or otherwise, to accord these inmates such treatment.”
The Resolution also requested Health Secretary Francisco Duque Jr. “ to look into this this particular problem existing among Rehabilitation Centers all over the country and to take appropriate actions and initiate corrective measures in order to address this problem.”