Don't Attribute Diseases to Witchcraft

A public Health Nurse on Tuesday advised communities to find ways of combating the outbreak of contagious diseases rather than attributing them to witchcraft and other superstitious beliefs. They should also desist from the practice of chasing away relations who are affected by such diseases as this could aggravate their plight.

Miss Marjorie Nimtori, Public Health Nurse at the Lawra Government Hospital made this call in an interview with the GNA following the banishing of a number of patients believed to have contracted certain diseases through witchcraft in some communities in the district.

She said late last year a 26-year-old woman was chased out of a community, because her sick child had allegedly inherited witchcraft from her grandparents.

Miss Nimtori, who is also in-charge of the Lawra District Nutrition Rehabilitation Centre said the child and her mother were granted "social asylum" at the centre only to realise that the child's continued sickness was due to malnutrition and not witchcraft as alleged by the people.

Miss Nimtori said since their admission at the rehabilitation centre, the child has gained weight and now looks healthy and called on families to stop such practices, which cast a slur on the proverbial Ghanaian hospitality.

She said it is pathetic that people do not appreciate government's efforts at bringing health to their doorsteps, and called on health workers to step up their educational programmes against witchcraft, which has gained a foothold in most of the communities of the region.