From Sebastian R. Freiku
The Sekyere Afram Plains District Assembly (SADA) has received a US$89,395 Japanese grant for the construction of a Health Centre at Hamidu, following a request made by the Assembly to the Japanese government last year.
The grant contract for the project was signed in January this year in Accra under Japan’s Grant Assistance for Grassroots Human Security Projects (GAHSP) Scheme. The district, which has a population of about 40,000 people, has no hospital.
The district has a high infant mortality rate, ranking highest in the region, and following inaccessible roads and absence of proper transport system, it takes pregnant women a minimum of three days to attend antenatal care and delivery.
With virtually no economic activity other than subsistence farming, the economy of the district is totally agrarian, with the income levels of the people very low. This combination, with an un-engineered rugged road network, has seriously affected the health status of the people.
Mr. Karoru Yoshimura, Japanese Ambassador to Ghana, hoped the grant would be utilised appropriately to achieve the intended objectives, and to enhance Ghana-Japan relationship. The District Chief Executive (DCE) for Sekyere Afram Plains, Fuseini Donkor, on behalf of the people of Hamidu and the entire district, expressed his outmost appreciation to the Japanese government.
He said until the creation of the district, it was the most deprived in the Ashanti Region, and relied heavily on three under-resourced CHPS compounds for health care delivery. The DCE disclosed that Hamidu and its environs, with a population of nearly 20,000, have no health facilitates, and the people have to travel more than 100 kilometres to access health care in the surrounding districts.
In 2012, only 11.9% and 4.3% of women attended ante-natal and post-natal care respectively. He was happy to note that the project was going to change the face of health care delivery in the district. Also, he reiterated the commitment of the people to own and sustain the project. Statistics indicates that 50% of general mortality is from treatable diseases such as malaria, typhoid fever, anaemia, pneumonia and the likes.
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