Korle-Bu records over 120 deliveries during Easter

The Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital registered 124 newborns during the Easter period with a greater percentage of the mothers going through normal and safe delivery, hospital sources told the Ghana News Agency on Tuesday.

The two labour wards, one and two, of the Hospital registered 77 male babies and 47 newborn females from Friday 25 to Monday 28.

Hospital officials say 77 of the babies came through ‘normal’ deliveries while operations were performed on the remaining 47.

Four sets of twins were born during the period while three sets came in the course of normal delivery but health officials said they performed caesarian section on one set.

Mrs Veronica Mensah, Principal Nursing Officer at the Labour Ward, said the facility did not record any death involving a mother but noted that some babies gave up during the period.

Ghana recorded a decline in its Maternal Mortality Rate by 49 percent between 1990 and 2013 but was still far behind the Millennium Development Goal 5 by the end of 214, according to United Nations report.

More than half of infant deaths in Ghana happen within the first month of life, and the newborn death rate has not improved in recent years, says UNICEF.

Malnutrition is a significant indirect cause of child mortality, contributing to one-third of all childhood deaths, it added.

Although levels of malnutrition in Ghana have dropped, 23 percent of children are stunted while 57 percent are anaemic.

Nutrition is particularly poor in Northern Ghana, where almost two in every five children are stunted and more than 80 percent of children suffer from anaemia.