Don’t travel abroad to work – Health Minister tells doctors

The Akufo-Addo regime is dismayed by the high rate at which medics leave the country to work abroad.

Accordingly, government is working assiduously to address the needs and challenges in Ghana’s Health Service that tend to put medics and other professionals off, therefore, health practitioners should show goodwill and good faith by waiting patiently.

Health Minister Kwaku Agyeman-Manu, who gave the assurance, was addressing the 14th Annual General and Scientific Meeting in Accra.

He noted that the government is going to pump some GHC1.3 billion into the health sector, as stipulated in the 2018 Budget read last month in Parliament, saying the figure underscores the importance the regime attaches to efficient health delivery.

In all, 115 medics graduated: 53 passed out as physicians, while 62 were surgeons.

Mr. Agyeman-Manu bared his frustration from the increasing rate at which doctors leave the country immediately they graduate to seek greener pastures abroad.

Though he admitted that the conditions of service in Ghana are unsatisfactory as compared to other nations; he, nonetheless, stressed that all efforts are being made to address the disparity.

He thus implored the medics to stay to work, upholding the ethics of their noble profession.

The event was under the theme: The Health Implications of Natural and Man-made Disasters in Ghana: Galamsey, Floods and Accidents.

Speaking on the subject, the Minister of the Environment, Science, Technology and Innovation, Kwabena Frimpong-Boateng, entreated all Ghanaians to desist from littering the environment, to prevent any national disaster.

Professor Frimpong-Boateng also used the occasion to announce that many fishes in the Volta Lake, especially tilapia, have recently been infected by a disease called streptococcus.

“Infected fishes show various swimming abnormalities such as swimming on their side and circular movement,” he explained.

Bemoaning the fact “some fish farmers have been treating the infected fishes with antibiotics in the lake and that makes the water dangerous for human consumption,” he assured that the government had found a safe and effective cure for the streptococcus.