Franklin Asiedu-Bekoe, Director of Public Health at the Ghana Health Service (GHS), has assured the public of the country’s preparedness to contain any potential Mpox outbreak.
In response to a question about Ghana’s readiness, Dr Asiedu-Bekoe highlighted several key measures that have been put in place to ensure effective surveillance and response.
“So I think that what is good for Ghana is the sensitivity of our surveillance system,” Asiedu-Bekoe stated. “What we have done is that we have set case definitions – what will make people look for suspect cases, so that is the first step.”
He emphasised that Ghana is well-equipped to confirm Mpox cases, a capability that only 30% of African countries possess.
“We have the capacity to confirm. In Africa, it is only 30% who have the ability to confirm, and yet in Ghana, we have two labs – we have Noguchi, we have our reference lab. So these are big pluses for us.”
Asiedu-Bekoe also noted the availability of treatment facilities, particularly for severe cases, which are a legacy of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“If they have a severe case, we have treatment centres which I will say are legacies from COVID. So these are pluses.”
However, he acknowledged the need for ongoing efforts to enhance preparedness.
“We need to now do more training. We also need to make sure that the health workers have enough PPEs so that they don’t get themselves infected, and then we also try to make sure that we create the necessary awareness.”
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Citinews
