Chief Executive of the Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital (KATH), Dr. Oheneba Owusu-Danso, has charged the media to strengthen its advocacy roles to ensure that Ghanaians adhere strictly to the covid-19 preventive protocols.
According to him, the involvement of the media in disseminating such information will significantly get the populace to be very careful of the virus and be compliant with preventive protocols.
“People should get to understand the negative impact of the virus and take appropriate decisions in their daily lives and this should be the responsibility of the media to embark on a sustained campaign”.
Addressing the media in Kumasi, Dr. Owusu-Danso pointed out that the reappearance of covid-19 infections in the country in the first weeks of January should be of great concern to all.
“The positivity rate in the first half of January is alarming and as I speak to you there are over 26 cases on admission while several others are at holding centres awaiting their test results”.
Dr. Owusu-Danso also revealed that management was working to upgrade the hospital’s specialist services by improving on the existing ones and also add on new specialist services.
He further noted that the hospital would this year commence operations of the GHC 2.2 million Assisted Reproductive Technology (ART) Centre which had been funded through the internally generated funds of the hospital.
Dr. Owusu-Danso said though the year 2020 was a challenging one due to the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic, management was able to procure and install various forms of equipment worth over eight million Ghana cedis in almost all the directorates and units to improve on service delivery and enhance quality healthcare for patients.
He commended the media for their continuous support to the hospital which had helped in the growth of the facility and improvement in its services to the public.
With Ghana’s case soaring to a recorded 191 new COVID-19 cases, it brings the country’s total active case count to 1,330 as at January 13, 2020.
The total cumulative case count since March 2020 now stands at 56,421 with 54,753 recoveries.
The Greater Accra, Ashanti, Western, Eastern, and Central Regions continue to lead with high infection rates.
Although the coronavirus cases went down below 1,000 active cases in the last quarter of 2020 in Ghana, the figure has been increasing steadily in recent times.
In the Western Region, the supervisor of the Takoradi Veterinary Laboratory, Dr. Simon Gbene, had said they are currently recording a high COVID-19 positivity rate raging around 30 percent per daily sample tested.
Dr. Gbene speaking in an interview said Takoradi attributed the high positivity rate on increased infections in air-conditioned environments.
“Currently, although the figures of daily samples are not as huge as they used to be, positivity is going up. For instance, an institution, which I cannot disclose its name due to patient confidentiality, brought us 75 samples and 22 were positive”.
Dr. Simon Gbene
Health officials in the country have attributed the seeming rise in the COVID-19 cases to lack of adherence to the preventive protocols such as wearing of nose mask.
