KCCR to serve as Ebola diagnostic centre

The Kumasi Centre for Collaborative Research in Tropical Medicine (KCCR), is working towards accreditation by the World Health Organization (WHO) to serve as Ebola Virus Diagnostic and Testing Centre.

This would make it the second diagnostic and testing centre for the deadly Ebola and other hemorrhagic infections, after Noguchi.

Professor Nii Odai, Pro-Vice Chancellor of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST), who announced this, said the accreditation of KCCR would strengthen the capacity of Ghana and the sub-region in the fight against the disease.

He was speaking at the opening of a two-week international training course on Ebola diagnostics at the KCCR in Kumasi.

Medical scientists and researchers from Ghana and the West Africa sub-region are attending the training, which is being conducted in collaboration with the Bernhard Nocht Institute of Tropical Medicine in Hamburg, Germany.

It is part of the processes towards the final accreditation of the Centre.

Prof Odai said the KCCR was matured and well placed to support health research in sub-Saharan Africa.

He called for financial and logistical support to enable it to efficiently discharge its mandate.

Dr. Kwaku Agyeman Mensah, the Minister of Health, said Ghana’s role as a logistics platform gave it an additional responsibility of ensuring the smooth implementation of the sub-regional response.

He said though the crisis seemed to be ebbing, active transmissions was continuing in the most affected countries of Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea, describing the strain on the health systems in the three countries as being beyond imagination.

He applauded the Bernhard Nocht Institute of Tropical Medicine and the German government for the sustained support towards building the needed capacity in medical research in Ghana.

He also commended the efforts of KCCR as an outstanding international platform for biomedical research in tropical medicine, especially in the area of neglected tropical diseases, and said, the government would offer all the required assistance to help it acquire the WHO certification and accreditation for Ebola virus diagnosis.

Mr Samuel Sarpong, the Ashanti Regional Minister, noted that the hemorrhagic Ebola viral fever could not be effectively treated without proper diagnosis.

He called on medical scientists and all other stakeholders to share valuable information on latest diagnostic technology on how to deal with the epidemic.

Prof Christian Meyer, Coordinator of the Ebola Training Project, said the training was targeted at medical scientists and researchers from Ghana, Togo, Benin, Mali and other West African countries considered to be at high risk of the spread of the disease.