Malaria prevalence drops from 86 to 27 per cent in Ghana
Malaria prevalence in Ghana has dropped considerably from 86.8 per cent to 27 .5 per cent, Dr Constance Bart-Plange, the Manager of the National Malaria Control Programme (NMCP), has announced.
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The achievement is partly attributed to the distribution of free insecticide treated nets to households throughout the country.
Addressing the opening session of the Media Malaria Advocacy Orientation for media practitioners in Accra Tuesday, Dr Bart-Plange, said a total of 11,443,69I mosquito treated nets had so far been distributed nationwide.
The meeting was organised by the NMCP, the John Hopkins University Centre for Communications Programmes and the Voices Against Malaria in partnership with the Ghana Media Malaria Advocacy Network (GMMAN).
The meeting, among others, was to help direct efforts towards energising the media to increase its advocacy support for programmes and actions in malaria management.
Dr Bart-Plange said almost 90 per cent of Ghanaian mothers of children under five years now knew the cause of malaria and were able to identify mosquito bite as being responsible for the disease.
That, she said, was a positive move to taking the right step in preventing the disease and properly treating it. “The NMCP is proud of the achievement,” she said.
Dr Bart-Plange called on the media and all partners to play their roles of providing and disseminating the required information that could enhance efforts to promote the adoption of the approved tools in preventing and treating malaria.
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For his part, Mr Emmanuel Fiagbey, Country Director, John Hopkins University Centre for Communications Programme, said malaria killed a child every 60 seconds in Africa and 655,000 people worldwide every year.
He said malaria increased health care cost for governments and led to loss of working days, a situation which contributed to absenteeism and decreased productivity at the workplace.
Mr Fiagbey indicated that malaria contributed to reduction in internal mobility and damage to the potential growth sectors of the economy such as tourism and deters foreign and local investors from moving their capital around.
According to him it was estimated that Africa’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) could be $100 billion higher today if malaria had been eliminated in the early 1960s.
He said a 10 per cent reduction in malaria cases was associated with 0.3 per cent higher annual growth of the economy of any country.
He said “any expenditure made in malaria prevention today is an investment in development for tomorrow, for the children saved today are surely the builders of tomorrow.”
Ms Rosemary Ardayfio, Chairperson of GMMAN, said the purpose of the programme was to ride on the back of the ongoing African Cup of Nations 2013 football season to improve upon the capacity of the media in Ghana to enable journalists sustain media advocacy for malaria programming.
Story by Mary Mensah