Sixty Community Malaria Ambassadors in some selected Districts in the Upper East Region had been trained under the, “Advocacy for Resources for Malaria Stoppage Initiative (ARMS)” Project.
The one year ARMS Project is being implemented by the Institute for Social Research and Development (ISRAD)- Ghana with funding support from the UKAID in six Districts of the Upper East Regions namely the Bolgatanga, Bongo, Kassena-Nankana West and Kassena-Nankana Municipal , Talensi and the Nabdam.
The one day training programme, organized by ISRAD in collaboration with the Ghana Health Service(GHS), saw 10 participants from each of the six beneficiary Districts and they are expected to undertake series of health promotion activities including house –to-house sensitization, groups and in-school-programmes and dusk-down sensitization in the communities.
Addressing them after the training, the Regional Coordinator of ISRAD- Ghana, Mr Abdul-RazakIssah, told them that as Community Malaria Ambassadors , they were also expected to promote the use of RDTs and use of Long Lasting Insecticide Nets for malaria prevention as well as help mobilize community members to participate in durbars and video shows and support the District Malaria Advocacy Groups for domestic resource mobilization.
They were also trained on how to use data tools for reporting the activities of the project.
The Regional Coordinator observed that malaria had been identified as one of the major leading causes of morbidity and mortality and yet policy makers were not paying special attention to the disease.
He stated that as it stood now as a result of donor fatigue, it was becoming difficult to mobilize funding to tackle the menace hence the need of the stakeholders to brainstorm on how to help mobilize local resources to complement government’s and the GHS in tackling the phenomenon.
He stated that the ARMS Project had the goal to contribute to the reduction of malaria in the country and also had among its objectives to increase the diagnosis of malaria by treatment, increase local government funding for malaria activities and reduce malaria cases.
The respective District Health Promotion Officers, who took the participants through the training, tasked them to be up and doing by disseminating the accurate and reliable health information that could contribute positively to improving the health needs of the people.
Mr Abdul-Razak Issah , the Regional Coordinator of ISRAD- Ghana, facilitating one of the training Programmes in the Bongo District
