Kelly’s jobseeker payments were cut off during a hospital stay for psychosis. It’s far from an isolated case

Kelly says Centrelink has told her psychosis isn’t a diagnosis but rather a ‘medical symptom’ and therefore, it does not excuse her from jobseeker appointments. Photograph: Blake Sharp-Wiggins/The Guardian

Kelly was sitting up in her hospital bed. Through the haze of heavy medication she was trying to tell the woman at the end of the phone line – an officer at Centrelink – what had happened. On 26 March, the 43-year-old had started experiencing psychosis and two weeks later, on 8 April, she was admitted to Macquarie hospital in New South Wales.

“I was completely out of my mind,” Kelly says. “When I had the psychosis, I thought I was being poisoned and people were watching me.