Ghana to establish 520 Community Health and Planning Services compounds nationwide
The Ministry of Health has entered into a Memorandum of Understanding with the Ghana Health Services for the later to set up 520 Community Health and Planning Services (CHPS) Compounds nationwide.
Mr Wilberforce Adade, Gomoa East Director of Health services announced this at the 2011 Annual Performance Review Meeting at Gomoa Afranse.
Mr Adade said the MOU formed part of efforts the Ministry was making to bring health delivery to the doorsteps of Ghanaians.
He said the District was to operationalise four CHPS Compounds this year.
Mr Adade said the District had six sub-districts, five health centres, eight CHPS Compounds and three private health facilities.
He said the absence of a District Hospital was seriously undermining health delivery in the area, adding that the District had only one medical doctor who was working in a private facility with a doctor-patient population ration of 1:142,000.
He mentioned the outbreak of Cholera epidemics, high malaria cases, low case detections, poor geographical accessibility to health services, inadequate administrative and clinical staff and frequent power outages as major concerns for the year under review.
The Director of Health said the District set 5,000 as a target for Out Patient Attendance but exceeded the target by 930, and said 9,456 target was set for CHPS Compounds attendant but only 6,542 was recorded.
Mr Benjamin Dadson, Disease Control Officer said six out of 41 cases of the cholera outbreak died due to delays in reporting to health facilities. He said hypertension was one of the top 10 diseases in the District.
Mr Dadson appealed to the government to upgrade one of the health centres into a District Hospital and post more health workers, especially nurses and midwives, to the District.
Mr Joe Appiah, Central Regional Manager of Plan Ghana, a child-oriented international non-governmental organisation, appealed to donor agencies to ensure that Insecticide-Treated mosquito nets and other support for African countries in the tropics were manufactured from material which was suitable for tropical conditions.
He said most Ghanaians felt uncomfortable to use the treated nets provided by UNICEF because they generated heat due to the nylon materials used.
Source: GNA