Medics beg Gov’t to subsidize cost of Hepatitis treatment in Ghana

Medics at the Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital (KATH) are calling on government to support hepatitis treatment in the country as Ghana marks World Hepatitis Day.

The call was made strongly on Friday when the Ghana Association for the Study of the Liver and Digestive Diseases organised free hepatitis tests and a lecture on the prevalence of the disease at KATH to commemorate the day.

The disease which presents in different strains has become one of the leading silent killers in Ghana outstripping deaths caused by malaria, Tuberculosis and HIV/AIDS.

Ivan Heathcote-Fumador, a Consultant Gastro-Enterologist with KATH and President of the Ghana Association for the Study of the Liver and Digestive Diseases Dr. Mary Afihene noted that the cost for treatment of viral hepatitis is still high in the country.

“In the US it can cost up to fifty thousand dollars. But governments in other African and low income countries have been able to negotiate for the generics at about nine hundred dollars, but in Ghana it hasn’t been done for us,” she lamented.

She indicated that some doctors sometimes had to endeavour on their own volition to beg other countries like Nigeria and Egypt to send them some of their drugs for their patients.

“In Ghana, it is not available and that’s why we have to depend on our friends in other neighbouring countries when we go for conferences and other places like Nigeria and Egypt to send us some for our patients. And you can only bring for someone you know,” she pointed out.

Beckoning government, Dr Afihene noted that the treatment is expensive and we are asking the government to consider making arrangements to make available, generic drugs that are lower priced but have been found to be efficacious so that people who are infected can get treatment”.

Director of health for the Kumasi Metropolis, Ghana Health Service Dr Alberta Britwum Nyarko who graced the occasion described the prevalence of viral Hepatitis in the country as a public health threat.

She disclosed that, “Here in Ghana for hepatitis b we have more than 8% prevalence and for Hepatitis C, we have about 5% to 10% prevalence.”

She however expressed concern with the disjointed communication and advocacy which she said had created room for charlatan institutions to infiltrate the country with fake and less efficacious treatments for Hepatitis.

Dr Alberta however revealed the country has a starved Hepatitis control program which does very little due to lack of funds.