Malaria, the biggest killer in Upper East

Bolgatanga, March 23,GNA -Malaria is the biggest killer in the Upper East Region as it dominates its Out Patients Department(OPD) attendance with pregnant women and children under five years being most vulnerable. According to Dr. Ernest Opoku, Deputy Director of Health Services, in-charge of Clinical Care, not much had been achieved in the fight against malaria due to the failure on the part of the Ghana Health Services to engage stakeholders such as community members, faith based groups, chiefs, researchers and other professionals in the decision-making process in the fight against the disease.

Dr. Opoku was addressing a five-day workshop organised to arm the staff of the organisation with knowledge to effectively implement malaria prevention programme funded by the American government under its Malaria Communities programme (MCP) which began on Tuesday in Bolgatang. Some of the participants were drawn from the Ghana Health Service (GHS) as part of strengthening the collaboration between ADDRO and the GHS to ensure that the MCP gets the support of key players in the health sector in the Bawku West and Garu-Tempane districts where the project is being implemented.

Under the MCP, ADDRO is to receive funds through the Episcopal Relief Development, (ERD) an American Church based charity which is the main agent on the programme to organise community durbars on Malaria. The program is expected to cover a population of 139,837, including 24,967 children under five (CU5), 6,991 pregnant women and 33,561 women of reproductive age for the next three years.

Main activities under the programme are capacity strengthening of communities by engaging community members, training and equipping over 1,000 community volunteers in participative health education, facilitation of behavior change, communication and information.

Dr. Opoku indicated that in spite of the challenges, some efforts had been made to reduce the disease drastically and mentioned the new malaria policy that ensures that suspected cases of malaria go through diagnostics to ascertain that existence of Malaria parasites before the patient is given appropriate treatments.

The Very Reverend Dr. Jacob Ayeebo, Executive Director, Anglican Diocesan Development and Relief Organization(ADDRO), said mosquito insecticide net usage was low in the Bawku West and Garu-Tempane districts in the Upper East though thousands of the Malaria prevention device had been distributed in the areas.

A new strategy known as "hung up" where community volunteers would move into households to hung Long Lasting Insecticide Impregnated Nets (LLINS) in the rooms of beneficiaries is to be pursued to reduce the incidence of Malaria in the project districts.

Rev. Dr. Ayeebo called for collaboration through consultations, networking, commitment and determination on the part of stakeholders to reduce malaria related cases in the region.

He commended the United States government, the Episcopal Relief Development, the GHS and the various beneficiary communities for the support and cooperation in getting the programme off the ground. 23 March 10