Accra, Oct. 10, GNA - The Ministry of Health is to kick-start an Integrated Child Health Campaign aimed at reducing under-five mortality rate by two-thirds by the year 2015.
The five-day campaign, combining measles and polio immunisation, administering of vitamin A and distributing 2.1 million free Insecticide Treated Nets (ITNs) to children under-five is expected to boost the survival of millions of children.
It would also involve mobilisation by every District Assembly, an inter-ministerial response; support from faith-based organisations and campaign visits and other initiatives by development partners and Ambassadors.
The campaign to be from November 1 to November 5 would be led by the Health Ministry and the Ghana Health Service (GHS) in collaboration with the district assemblies and supported by other development partners in the health sector.
At a high level meeting on the Integrated Child Health Campaign in Accra, Health Minister, Courage Quashigah expressed worry about Ghana's mortality rate, which stood at 111 to 1,000 live births, an increase over the last Demographic and Health Survey figure of 109 to a 1,000 live birth saying "this is unacceptable".
He said one of the targets of the Millennium Development Goals was to reduce under-five mortality by 2015 and expressed the hope that the campaign would impact positively on reduction of under-five mortality. The Minister admitted that the campaign presented an enormous challenge but also an opportunity to improve the health and well being of children.
Major Quashigah, therefore, tasked the Ministry of Energy to ensure that electricity was not interrupted during the period to enable health providers to store vaccines properly.
He also urged the Ministry of Women and Children's Affairs to create the needed awareness among women groups to send their children to the various vaccination points.
He urged foreign missions to adopt regions to help to break the bottlenecks the prevented people from being vaccinated as well as monitor the programme adding "the success of this campaign will require the close and effective collaboration of all of us".
Ms Dorothy Rozga, UNICEF Country Representative, who presented a paper on the "Overview and Impact of Campaigns", said under-five mortality rates in the country had not improved and startling evidence showed that children continued to die needlessly.
She said simple, proven and cost effective health and nutrition intervention, like that of the campaign, could prevent loss of lives among infants and children.
"The good news is that since the 2002 measles campaign in Ghana, no child had died from measles and there has been no polio since 2003,=94 Dr Rozga said.
She noted that such campaigns had worked in most African countries including Zambia where the introduction of bed nets had achieved 95 per cent results.
Dr Rozga said if the estimated 2.1 million nets were distributed in the upcoming campaign 52,000 lives could be saved.
Dr Constance Bart-Plange, Malaria Control Programme Manager, said malaria was still the leading cause of death in the country despite various interventions put in place from the 1950s.
Dr Kwadwo Antwi Agyei, Programme Manager of the Expanded Programme on Immunisation, said there would be 9,050 immunisation points, 9,505 vaccinators, 28,514 volunteers to ensure that all the children were reached.
The campaign, he said, was expected to target about 5.959 million children from 0 months to 59 months for polio and about 5.065 million children from 9 months to 59 months for measles and would cost about 149 billion cedis. 10 Oct. 06
