Ghana finds success in COVID-19 mass vaccination campaigns

Ghana, the first country in the world to receive COVID-19 vaccines from the COVAX Facility, kicked off its vaccination drive on 1 March 2021, making its rollout among the longest-running in Africa. Despite the longevity of its vaccination programme, by the beginning of 2022, less than half of the target population of 20 million people had received at least one vaccine dose and only about 13% were fully vaccinated. 

More COVID-19 vaccines arrive in Ghana

hana’s robust COVID-19 vaccination campaign continues to receive a boost with donations through the COVAX Facility. 
The Ministry of Health has in the past few weeks, taken delivery of more than 2 million doses of AstraZeneca’s Covishield vaccines from the Governments of Germany, Denmark, Iceland, Norway with Germany contributing the largest single consignment of over 1.5 million doses.
The donations are in fulfillment of pledges made by the governments to contribute to COVAX.

WHO Ghana supports ongoing COVID-19 vaccine rollout with digital tablets

The World Health Organization has reiterated its commitment to helping the Government of Ghana achieve its set target for the COVID-19 vaccine rollout by presenting 1 000 pieces of digital tablets to support the ongoing vaccination campaign.
Presenting the items to the Ghana Health Service, Dr Sally-Ann Ohene, Disease Prevention and Control Officer at the World Health Organization Ghana Country Office said the tablets were to be used to scale up e-registration at the various vaccination centres and help reduce delays in data entry. 

Partners call for safe maternal and newborn care on National Patient Safety Day

The Ministry of Health and partners have collectively called for safe maternal and newborn care in Ghana at the 3rd National Patient Safety and Healthcare Quality Conference in Accra. The conference, which culminated in the observation of the 2021 Patient Safety Day, was under the theme: “No Quality, No Coverage; Safe Maternal and Newborn Care Now”.
 

Ghana launches National Breastfeeding Week

The World Health Organization has joined the Ministry of Health, the Ghana Health Service, and partners to launch the 2021 National Breastfeeding Week celebration under the theme, Protect Breastfeeding: A shared responsibility. 

This year’s event will focus on raising awareness and galvanizing action on protecting breastfeeding to improve public health. The week-long celebration will be marked with a call on stakeholders to make investments and commitments to support actions aimed at reducing   malnutrition amongst newborns, infants, and young children in Ghana.

• WHO launches Leadership for Health Transformation Programme to provide high-level ...

Universal Health Coverage (UHC) has gained momentum, especially among developing countries. Ghana’s UHC Roadmap, launched in 2020, will shape health care in the country till 2030. 
Straightening all crooked paths leading to the achievement of UHC, where all people have access to the health services they need, when and where they need them, and without financial hardship requires a critical look at health sector reforms.

Ghana Infectious Disease Center installs first Arterial Blood Gas Analyzer

Ghana like many other countries across the globe, is grappling with a third wave of the COVID-19 pandemic driven by the delta variant. Since July 2021, the number of new COVID-19 cases recorded have increased significantly by 6.5 times compared to the month of June 2021 with 5-fold increase in deaths. All efforts are being made to provide the best of care to COVID patients but with only 2.7% of the population fully vaccinated and the delta variant in circulation, the country still stands a   high risk of COVID-19 infections with increased hospitalizations.