Under-five malaria fatality rate drops in Ghana
The rate of fatality of malaria cases among Ghanaian children under-five years of age has dropped from 14.4 per cent in 2000 to 0.6 per cent in 2012.
This means that, for every 1,000 children under-five admitted to hospital with malaria, 850 survived in 2000 while in 2012, the number of those who survived was 994.
Dr. Felicia Amoo-Sakyi, Malaria Case Management Programme Officer for the National Malaria Control Programme (NMCP) disclosed this at a press briefing ahead of the National World Malaria Day celebration scheduled to take place in Wa on Friday.
A new malaria control intervention known as the Seasonal Malaria Chemoprevention (SMC) would be launched by the Ministry of Health (MoH)/Ghana Health Service (GHS) as part of the celebration of the day.
The SMC, formerly known as Intermittent Preventive Treatment, involves intermittent administration of full treatment courses of an anti-malaria medicine during the malaria season to prevent malaria illness.
Targeted at the Upper West, Upper East and Northern Regions, the SMC’s objective is to provide protection against clinical illness throughout the period of malaria risk.
Dr. Amoo-Sakyi said issues considered in deciding to adopt the SMC intervention include the seasonality of malaria transmission and rainfall patterns, the incidence of malaria and the potential delivery mechanisms among others.
She said the target areas for implementation were areas where transmission was more than 60 per cent of clinical malaria cases occurring during a short period of about four months.
She said the clinical attack rate of malaria was greater than 0.1 per cent attack per transmission season in the target age group.
Dr. Amoo-Sakyi noted that the intervention covered children between the ages of 3-59 months and that, during the campaign, there shall be free distribution of Long Lasting Insecticide Treated Nets (LLITNs) at primary schools and health centers among others.
She said there would also be a scaling up of parasite-based diagnosis to all age groups at all levels countrywide, using the Test, Treat and Track initiative (the T3 Formula).
Dr. Amoo-Sakyi said defeating malaria requires the engagement of a number of sectors outside health, including finance, education, defense, environment, mining industry, tourism, local government and the media.
Source: GNA
Students join the fight against malaria
Students of the Ghana Institute of Journalism (GIJ) have joined forces with the African Media and Malaria Research Network (AMMREN) to eliminate malaria in Ghana.
The move is to widen the platform for advocacy communication towards the elimination of the disease.
A seven-member student executive to steer the affairs of the AMMREN -GIJ chapter has, therefore, been sworn in to serve as agents of change in the malaria elimination efforts.
Gains
Speaking at the inauguration of the executive in Accra, a Programme Officer of the National Malaria Control Programme (NMCP), Ms Vivian Aubyn, said in spite of the gains made in the efforts to eliminate malaria from Ghana, illnesses due to malaria were still high.
According to her, rural, hard to reach areas, residents of urban poor communities and people in the northern sector of the country are the most affected.
She said the NMCP had collaborated with stakeholders to draft a new strategic plan, starting from 2014 to 2018, that would focus on accelerated control and concentrate efforts in the high transmission areas in the Upper West, Upper East and Northern regions.
Net distribution
So far, Ms Aubyn said bed nets distribution in antenatal clinics and schools (targeting pregnant women and children less than five years) had increased coverage and helped in preventing malaria.
“I must say that the distribution of nets in schools started in July last year and has been embraced by teachers, communities and schoolchildren to the extent that the NMCP office has been inundated with telephone calls,” she said.
She pointed out that the era when every fever case was treated as malaria was over and that the new policy was to diagnose all suspected cases under the test, treat and track strategy.
“This requires all suspected fever cases to be tested and only cases with positive malaria test results treated with anti-malaria drugs,” he said.
Behavioural in School change
A researcher at the Dodowa Health Research Centre, Dr Alberta Amu, advocated the accelerated distribution of insecticide treated nets to all age groups to achieve universal access.
She also said there was the need for behavioural change communication strategies which would educate individuals on the need to sleep in treated nets to prevent malaria.
“Malaria elimination in Ghana is feasible and doable. It would require team effort and long-term consistent commitment from all stakeholders,” Dr Amu said.
GIJChapter
The Executive Secretary of AMMREN, Mrs Charity Binka, stated that malaria was a major public health problem in Ghana and a development issue.
She said the AMMREN-GIJ chapter sought to attract young journalists to advocate the post-2015 Millennium Development Goal agenda of eradicating malaria.
The Rector of GIJ, Mr David Newton, said the institute had designed a new course in health communication, which is awaiting approval from the National Accreditation Board (NAB), to increase health reporting and communication.
68% of primary 6 pupils can’t read
A survey conducted by World Vision Ghana has revealed that only 32 percent of children who have completed primary six in the West Gonja District are able to read and write with comprehension.
This abysmal performance falls below the national average of 35.3 percent that government and other development partners are collaborating to turn around.
This follows an earlier survey by the Ghana Education Service (GES) which showed that 98 percent of primary two pupils in various schools in the country can neither read nor understand English or any Ghanaian language properly.
World Vision Ghana’s Programme Manager in charge of West Gonja District, Paul Azeka Asia said his outfit used the Functional Literacy Tool (FLAT) to assess the performance of class six pupils who gained admission into Junior High School one.
Source: citifmonline.com 23 September 2014
