Families pledge to hand over relatives from Liberia

Dr Kweku Agyeman Mensah, the Minister of Health, has said relatives of Ghanaian fishermen in Ebola infected countries have undertaken submit to health officials any relative who would return to Ghana for thorough Ebola test.

He said this was due to the on-going Ebola Educational Campaign by the government and civil society organizations pertaining to the possibility of relatives in Ghana getting infected should they interact or hide such relatives on their return to Ghana with Ebola symptoms.

Dr Agyeman Mensah said this on Monday when he inaugurated three Ebola testing machines known as “Walk Through Temperature Scan,” at the Arrival Hall of the Kotoka International Airport (KIA) in Accra.

The machines and their installation cost $200,000.00 and would screen all persons who arrive at the airport before they depart to any part of the country.

He said the government had also distributed 10,000 Personal Protective Clothes to health facilities across the country including private ones.

He urged the media to help Government in its quest to make Ghanaians conscious of the disease and desist from act which lead to their contraction.

He said while the Isolation Centre at Tema is about 95 per cent completed, the Kumasi and Tamale centres are progressing speedily.

The Health Minister said the government was leaving no stone unturned in its efforts to prevent the possible spread of Ebola disease to Ghana from neigbouring countries.

“We should all take note that the risk factors in the countries where the disease has claimed lives and affected thousands are the same in Ghana,” he said.

Mrs Dzifa Attivor, the Minister of Transport, said the government had also provided all the other airports in the country with hand-held thermometer which would be used to screen people on arrival.

Explaining how the Walk Through Machines work, Mr Raphael John Marfo, Head of Port Health, KIA, said the machine is strategically located at the arrival gate have to automatically go through the sensor which is monitored on the screen.

“People with temperature above 38 Degrees Celsius is immediately detected on the computer screen by the officials and picked up. He or she is then sent to an Isolation Centre which had also been set up at the airport for further checks,” he said.

He said if further checks detects that an isolated persons is suffering from the Ebola disease, he or she is then sent to the Ebola Centre located at Tema for the needed Ebola treatment.

He said all persons arriving from countries which had recorded incidences of Ebola were given Health Declaration Forms to fill to enable health officials at the airport give them the needed attention.

The two ministers also visited the Ebola Isolation Centre located at KIA.