Pregnant Women Dying in Wulensi

Reports from the Wulensi constituency of the Northern region have it that many pregnant women and those in labour have died on their way to the Yendi and Salaga hospitals over the years.

Similarly, countless snake-bite victims have also perished on their way to the same hospitals.

The member of Parliament (MP) for Wulensi, Wumbe Karim, in his maiden statement in Parliament yesterday attributed the sad state of affairs to the poor nature of the roads.

"In fact, it takes the fastest moving truck five hours to ply from Wulensi to Yendi and over seven hours to Salaga. Even this is only possible in the dry season."

The nearest hospital to Wulensi, the constituency headquarters, which is Yendi is about 96 kilometres away and has never seen any major repairs since its construction by Ghana's colonial masters.

Mr. Karim said the seasonal outbreaks of cholera and cerebrospinal meningitis (CSM) have also taken their toll on the lives of his people.

Hear him: "Because of lack of a hospital in Naum, these otherwise preventable deaths are often blamed on some poor old women for being the cause of such untimely deaths through witchcraft."

The member regretted that most often, the so-called witches are lynched or maimed while those of them who survive the venom of the aggrieved are banned from the towns and villages and sent to a so-called witches village.

At present, there are three witches' villages in the Wulensi constituency alone whose health status is very precarious.

Mr. Karim told members of the House of how the people take in drugs which have not been prescribed by competent medical officers and the influx of quack doctors, which often leads to serious complications.

While the serious health conditions worsen, the upgrading of the Bimbilla Health Centre to a district hospital has been on the drawing board since the 1980s.

He therefore praised the New Patriotic Party administration for giving the green light for the upgrading of the centre to a modern district hospital, scheduled to be completed by the end of this year.

Mr. Karim appealed to the sector minister to act with dispatch to save the situation.