Go back to work; Osu Mantse pleads with doctors

Nii Okwei Kinka Dowuona VI, Paramount Chief of Osu and President of the Osu Traditional Council, has pleaded with the striking doctors to rescind their decision and resume work.

He said the doctors need to show compassion and to remember the oath they swore to save lives.

The Osu Mantse made the appeal when Vodafone Ghana Foundation Healthfest organised a free health screening exercise for the people of Osu on Saturday, as part of this year’s Homowo festival celebrations, at Osu, in the Greater Accra Region.

The Vodafone Ghana Foundation Healthfest is a variety of health support package of the communication giant to communities across Ghana with its partners GSK, a free dental services providers and Operation Smile Ghana, providers of free lip and cleft palate operations.

Nii Kinka Dowuona appealed to the Doctors not to extend their strike for another week as they had indicated, adding that, “although they need better conditions of service they should also look at the plight of the people.”

“We are pleading with them to soften their entrenched position and go back to work whilst their leaders negotiate with government,” he said.

The Osu Mantse expressed gratitude to the Vodafone Ghana Foundation Healthfest for the screening and appealed to them to regularly organise such services for the people.

Nana Yaa Afriyie Ofori-Koree, Head of Vodafone Ghana Foundation in an interview with the Ghana News Agency said the Healthfest is mini clinic of free health screening, provision of free dental examination and free lip and cleft surgery, as well as the dispensing of drugs to the people.

She said the package is extended to the communities as the company’s corporate-social responsibility of giving back to society.

She said over 600 people, including the elderly and children were catered for during the screening.

Ms Sabrina Ghiddi, Regional Manager of Western/Southern Africa of Operation Smile, providers of free lip and cleft palate surgery said they are working in partnership with the Ghana Health Service.

She said Operation Smile has been offering their services in 60 countries worldwide for the past 35 years.

Ms Ghiddi said lip and cleft palates are not a curse, and that, they could be corrected within 45 minutes of surgery and asked that the stigmatization of people with such problems must cease.

She said they are training local teams across the country to take over from the voluntary missionaries to help eradicate lip and cleft palate problems.

She said Operation Smile provides for each patient and one guardian, from anywhere in Ghana free transportation, accommodation and meals and urged people with such problems to call 050-240-7860 or 024-191-7137 for registration.

Doctors from the La General Hospital, the Holy Trinity and the Volta River Authority Hospitals detected health problems like hypertension, malaria and general body pains during the screening exercise.