NACOB
The Brong-Ahafo Regional Deputy Director of the Narcotics Control Board (NACOB), Kofi Boateng, has expressed worry over the practice where drugs are being sold in classrooms of some basic schools in the Sunyani West District.
According to him, some pupils in basic school have resorted to the criminal act of selling Indian hemp, a development he fears if not immediately halted will surely negatively affect the future of the young ones.
Mr Kofi Boateng made the disclosure at a day’s stakeholders’ meeting organised by the Sunyani West District Assembly to address Adolescent Reproductive Health Issues at Odumase in the Brong-Ahafo Region.
He attributed the selling of drugs and smoking by the students as one of the factors that has caused their worsening performance in the Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE) for several years.
The NACOB Regional Boss, stated that drugs could damage both the brain and the reproductive system of the adolescent youth and cited that the 2014 statistics by the NCB indicated about 10,974 youth were in the rehabilitation centres in the country because of drugs.
Mr Boateng noted that drug abuse and addiction also caused sexual exposure which could lead to teenage pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases that have been major health issues affecting the adolescents in the country.
He therefore appealed to parents, guardians, teachers and all stakeholders to collaborate for the successful implementation of Ghana Adolescents Reproductive Health Project the government through the Ghana Health Service and the Ghana Education Service to save the nation’s adolescents and youth from those destructive habits and behaviour for them to become responsible adults.
Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP) Joseph Kwame Apoya, the Regional Coordinator of Domestic Violence and Victim Support Unit (DOVVSU) advised females, particularly the adolescents to desist from illegal and unsafe abortion and visit health facilities for expert advice and qualify services whenever they are pregnant.
