Ghana continues to bear the brunt of the burden of malaria as a major public health disease because of the barriers in communicating effective control measures, Health Minister, Alex Segbefia has observed.
According to him, Ghana in 2015, recorded about 10.1million Out Patient Department (OPD) cases of malaria, representing an increase of 20.2% over the previous year even though fatalities declined by 3%.
He said malaria continues to plaque many homes, causing severe economic and social impact on the country on a larger scale.
For instance, he said malaria is one of the causes of household poverty because it results in absenteeism from the daily activities of productive living and income generation.
It also continues to prevent many school children from attending school due to illness, thereby, diminishing their capacity to realize their full potentials.
The situation, he argued, must cease, calling on all who matters in combating malaria to do more in terms of educating the public about the threats posed by the deadly disease.
“This should not be the case because we are in era where many discoveries and proven interventions are available for combating malaria”.
“We will continue to strengthen our relationship with donor partners in terms of assisting us deal with malaria. But we must begin to do more on the education side. We are looking at how to reduce the numbers and also do a lot of prevention. We hope to get to a point where we can completely eradicate it just as some countries like Cuba have done. In 5 to 10 years, we hope to get there”, he noted when he launched the National Mass Media Malaria Campaign in Accra, Tuesday.
He added “the behavioral change communication (BCC) component when added to key malaria interventions can help individuals and communities to over the barriers”.
The BCC is a tool used in malaria control to encourage diagnostic testing fevers by both consumers and providers and is the necessary step for improved treatment of malaria.
It is vital in building trust in tests results, particularly, when a patient receives malaria negative results and are unsure of what to do next.
BCC is also necessary in promoting anti-natal clinic attendance and preventive treatment for pregnant women.
Acting Programs Manage, National Malaria Control Program (NMCP), Dr. Keziah, commenting on the event bemoaned the blatant neglect of the use of treated insecticide nets, insisting that its use has proven to be the best way in preventing malaria.
“People say they feel hot, uneasy and sometimes cannot sleep in a mosquito net but that is better than allowing yourself to be infected and sleeping in a hospital bed”, she noted.
In 2015, about 214 million people worldwide were infected with the malaria virus while 430, 000 died of the disease.
In Ghana, malaria contributes about 30% of all Out Patient Department (OPD) cases. The country, currently, records about 5 deaths in every 10,000 cases.
To combat this, she said the NMCP has initiated a campaign to encourage the use of the insecticide treated nets (ITN)
In view of this, the NMCP has rolled out a campaign to encourage the use of the Insecticide Treated Nets (ITN).
“The national mass media campaign on the promotion of long lasting insecticide treated nets hopes to increase the number of people that sleep in the ITN so that people get up and go look for the nets themselves and sleep in it instead of using it for fishing and other wrong purposes. In the next three months, we will collaborate with the media to ensure that people utilize the nets properly because it is very important in dealing with malaria”.
