Coronavirus: Treatment centers, hospital staff stretched – GMA

The Ghana Medical Association, GMA has expressed concerns that the government has let its guard down hence the increasing numbers of the coronavirus infections in the country lately.

Ghana’s Covid-19 current figures stand at 1,267 with 338 deaths.

The Deputy General Secretary of the GMA, Dr. Titus Beyuo speaking on the Sunrise Morning Show on 3FM stated “ I can confirm that staff are being stretched, our treatment centers are being stretched, there is no denying that fact. Over the weekend I had calls from colleagues, I had calls from friends and families who have been trying to get to some places but it has not been easy. When we say stretched, it doesn’t mean they are all full to capacity and cannot admit but the human resource for instance is a big challenge. In the initial phase of our reforms, we mobilized staff from other hospitals to the treatment centers to provide services and a lot of these people have become fatigued after maintaining the fight”.

The GMA further wants government to check the private labs and questioned whether the national data base software where all the private labs are supposed to upload their results are really doing it, this he said is causing the figures to be disconnected and causing a lot symptomatic patients to be walking freely without a trace.

“Over the weekend I have had more than 7 people calling me, they have gone to private labs or even some government labs gotten themselves tested because they were symptomatic. They got their results they were positive and now they don’t know what to do next because they are not hooked unto the system, nobody is following them up” he complained.

Meanwhile the GMA is calling for a total overview of the entire Covid- 19 fight and look at what has been done right or wrong. “Until we have that review of our strategies I don’t think we will succeed. We need to come together because if you look at the success of our reforms, the testing for instance there are challenges there. There are gaps in the testing; we are having people who are having symptoms and not sure how to even get tested. Some go to the private centers on their own and get tested and they are not hooked unto the national healthcare systems and this is something the Ghana Health Service admits”.