POOR ATTENTION TO EYE CARE WORRIES DR DEBRAH (PAGE 42, OCT 20, 2010)

THE Head of the National Eye Care Unit of the Ghana Health Service (GHS), Dr Oscar Debrah, has expressed concern about the lack of attention given to eye care as compared to diseases like malaria, HIV/AIDS or tuberculosis.
He said unlike the attention other sectors of the healthcare services were receiving across the country in recent times, eye care in particular lacked specialists in the Upper West and the Volta regions while the Northern, Upper East and the Brong Ahafo regions had a specialist each even though Accra alone had 54 eye specialists.
Dr Debrah expressed the concern when he addressed a durbar in Wa, the Upper West regional capital, to mark the launch of the national edition of the world sight day.
“Poverty and blindness go hand-in-hand so if Ghana as a country wants to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), then we have to pay much attention to eye care”, he stated.
Dr Debrah, therefore, called on the Director-General of the Ghana Health Service (GHS) to help address the problem.
The event, although national in character, attracted an unimpressive crowd, who went on a float through the principal streets of Wa before converging on the jubilee park for the durbar.
It was on the theme: “Count down to vision 2020: The right to sight, how far have we come?
Health personnel took turns to take members of the public through several medical and health checks including, eye care, blood pressure and Voluntary Counselling and Testing of HIV status.
Dr Debrah, who is an ophthalmologist, lamented that throughout the country, when it came to infrastructure for optical services, it was always an afterthought and questioned why in most cases, many of those facilities were sited close to the mortuary.
On the furnishing of those structures, Dr Debrah said, “We always have the worst of equipment, which are very archaic and obsolete,” adding that it was unfortunate that the Ministry of Health was not investing in eyecare equipment.
He mentioned cataract, glaucoma and trachoma as the major causes of blindness in the country.
Dr Debrah explained that cataract was the leading cause of blindness across the country contributing to over 50 per cent of blind cases.
He said about 46,000 surgeries would have to be conducted in a year if people were to be prevented from going blind through cataract infections.
On Trachoma, Dr Debrah called for intensive surveillance to identify and attend to new cases before it got out of hand.
He said due to some interventions such as child immunisation, blind cases, particularly among children in the Northern and Upper West regions had declined considerably.
Touching on Glaucoma, he stated that it was inherited from relations, adding that over 600,000 people across the country had the disease but 90 per cent of those people were not aware that they had it.
He commended various institutions, including the Standard Chartered Bank, the Swiss Red Cross and Sight Savers, for their immense contribution to eye care in the country over the years.
In a speech read on his behalf, the Minister of Health, Dr Benjamin Kunbour, expressed the support of the government to improve on eye care in the country.
He called for the integration of primary eye care into the primary healthcare systems to enable eye health to receive the necessary recognition it deserved.
The Upper West Regional Director of the GHS, Dr Alexis Nang Beifubah, said with the support of the Catholic Church and the Swiss Red Cross, the region could now boast eye care services in all the district health facilities.
He added that the challenge currently was the non-availability of a resident ophthalmologist.
Dr Beifubah, however, appealed to the people to take advantage of the existing facilities rather than visiting quack doctors for such care.

CLIENT SERVICE CENTRE FOR WA LANDS COMMISSION (PAGE 22, OCT 15, 2010)

THE new Lands Commission in Wa in the Upper West Region has set up a client service centre to help streamline the activities of the secretariat.
The acting Regional Lands Officer, Mr David Mwinfor Deribaa, who made this known to the Daily Graphic in Wa, said the measures were aimed at warding off all quack land officers who invaded the premises of the secretariat and claimed to be offering services on behalf of the office.
He said with the new service centre in place, all visitors who needed the services of the office must pass through the client service centre before any service would be rendered to them.
“The purpose of these measures is to streamline and ensure a transparent, sustainable, efficient, cost effective and timely delivery of our services to the public,” he stated.
According to Mr Deribaa, the measures were to ensure the production of reliable, credible and secured tenures for land title holdings.
“From October 1, 2010, any person who obtains our services without passing through the customer service centre will be to his/her own disadvantage,” he warned.
Mr Deribaa mentioned some of the services of the secretariat as site plans for the preparation of leases, investigations into the genuineness of lands purchased, stamping of documents for stamp duty payments which included tax clearance certificates and deeds registration.
He said the situation where clients sought the services of people from the veranda of the secretariat to offer those services would be a thing of the past.
Mr Deribaa said some of those practices led to situations where many people fell prey to the activities of some staff of the commission who collected money from them without doing any work.
He added that apart from taking money from unsuspecting clients,  most of those people who collected the money might not even be competent enough.
Mr Deribaa charged the building inspectorate division of the district assemblies to be up to the task by regularly checking and abating all haphazard developments.

UDS NEEDS MORE FACILITIES (PAGE 11, OCT 13, 2010)

THE Dean of the Faculty of Integrated Development Studies (FIDS) of the Wa Campus of the University for Development Studies (UDS), Professor Abraham Berinyu, has called for a rigorous approach in the improvement of facilities of the university, particularly the Wa Campus.
That, he noted, would enhance the quality of programmes offered by the university.
Addressing the 18th matriculation ceremony of the Wa Campus of the UDS at Wa in the Upper West Region, Professor Berinyu stressed the need for an urgent look at the provision of residential accommodation for both lecturers and students.
He further mentioned in particular the exploitation by landlords in the Wa municipality who charged both lecturers and students astronomical rates and called on the government to assist the school.
“The government through the appropriate institutions must ensure that both staff and students of this university are not exploited, especially by landlords who charge exhorbitant rents because staff and students are in dire need of accommodation”, he emphasized.
Professor Berinyu also appealed for more resources to be allocated to the university.
In a speech read on his behalf, the Vice Chancellor of the UDS, Professor Haruna Yakubu, paid tribute to his predecessors and stated his vision for the institution.
“My vision for this university is to provide continuing leadership in the areas already developed and to further develop the university into a practically oriented institution which is international-recognized for academic excellence and community development”, the Vice Chancellor indicated.
In the area of Information, Communication and Technology (ICT) development, Professor Yakubu gave the assurance that the university was developing an ICT policy and robust programme aimed at making the entire university community ICT compliant.
Out of a total of 16, 025 applications received by the university, only 14, 526 applicants were admitted to pursue both degree and diploma programmes.
He said a deliberate strategy had been adopted by the university to ensure an increase in the admission of more female applicants and those from deprived communities in the three northern regions, especially for the medical programmes.
He mentioned some of the new programmes introduced at the Wa Campus of the university as Bachelor of Education and BA in Integrated Management and Business Studies.
On the graduate programmes, the Vice Chancellor said MSc in Leadership and Development, MSc in Business Finance, as well as MSc and MPhil in Community Health and Development had also been introduced this year.

CHANGE ATTITUDE TOWARDS MENTALLY CHALLENGED — BAHASS FOUNDATION (BACK PAGE, OCT 12, 2010)

THE Executive Director of the Bahass Foundation, a non-governmental organisation, Mr Samsideen Iddrisu, has called for a change of attitude towards the mentally challenged in society.
He said the present way of catering for that category of people and the neglect by society came along with dire consequences.
He, therefore, stressed the need for a multi-faceted approach towards taking care of mentally challenged persons in the country.
Mr Iddrisu said this when the Rural Action Aid Programme (RAAP) presented items, including a cheque for GH¢50, used clothes, bags of rice, cooking oil and a motorcycle, all worth GH¢1,750, to the Bahass Foundation in Wa.
The items are to facilitate the work of the foundation in its quest to clear the Wa municipality of the mentally ill and to cater for their needs.
Earlier, members of the foundation had gone round the municipality to pick about 60 mentally sick people, bathed, shaved and clothed them, after which they were given food.
At the presentation ceremony, the Upper West Regional Director of the Department of Social Welfare, Mr Hamidu Haruna, urged the various district assemblies to extend the disability fund of their common fund for the upkeep of the mentally deranged.
The Upper West Regional Minister, Alhaji Issahaku Salia, who presented the items to the foundation, also reiterated the need to give more attention and support to mental patients.

SUPPORT GOVT TO DELIVER AGENDA — DAKURA (PAGE 12, OCT 9, 2010)

THE Upper West Regional Secretary of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), Mr Eric Dakurah, has said the ‘Better Ghana’ agenda set by Professor Mills’ government is not meant for a selective few but rather the entire Ghanaian populace.
He has, therefore, called on all to give the government the total support in its quest to deliver on its promises.
He said instances where some people dissociated themselves or undermined programmes and projects being undertaken by the government was an affront to the total development of the country and its people.
Mr Dakurah, who was speaking to the Daily Graphic in Wa, expressed concern about reports of shortage of materials and other logistics for the ongoing national population and housing census and said, “I suspect some saboteurs who are at work to ensure that the exercise does not succeed.”
He described the situation as worrisome, saying the staff of the Ghana Statistical Service (GSS) are professionals who are on top of their work and therefore, it was surprising that there are reports of shortage of materials.
“It is the will of God for the NDC to be in power and so once we are in power, I expect all Ghanaians irrespective of ethnic, political or religious background to support President Mills’ government to deliver,” the NDC regional secretary stated.
Commenting on Presidents Mills’ recent trip to China and Japan, Mr Dakurah said considering the support from the two countries, it was an indication that the ‘Better Ghana’ agenda of the NDC government was on course.
That, he explained, was because the total amount to be derived from the President’s trip would facilitate a massive infrastructure development, as well as a drastic improvement in services in the country.
Mr Dakurah further mentioned in particular the support the Upper West Region and the whole country had enjoyed over the years from the Japan International Co-operation Agency (JICA) in the area of training and capacity building for health workers and commended the two countries, Japan and China, for continuing to forge a closer relationship with Ghana.
He expressed optimism that with the kind of assistance Ghana was enjoying from its international partners, the mandate of the NDC would be renewed by Ghanaians come the 2012 general elections.
That, he said, would be based on the works of the NDC government which would be a testimony for all to use as a yardstick to measure the performance of President Mills’ government.

NPP URGES GOVT TO RESOLVE STRIKE ACTION BY UTAG (PAGE 13, OCT 6, 2010)

THE Upper West Regional Second Vice- Chairman of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Mr Hafiz Bin Salih, has called for a swift resolution of the strike action by the University Teachers Association of Ghana (UTAG) in order not to disrupt the academic calendar of public universities in the country.
He said the education sector had in recent times been bedevilled with too many problems and, therefore, if care was not taken, the country’s education system would be in disarray.
“We do not want a situation where the academic calendar of the universities would be thrown overboard. Already, we are having problems with the senior high schools and as of now, parents do not even know whether their wards who have qualified into the SHS are going to school or not,” Mr Bin Salih noted with concern and called on the government to dialogue with the UTAG.
He cautioned the government against taking an entrenched position on the matter, saying “Government must tolerate UTAG and sit down with them to address their concerns”.
Mr Salih was not happy about the manner in which the NDC government seemed to be toying with the future of the country’s youth through its posture on matters related to education and said this was a government he expected much from with respect to education since the president himself was a teacher.
He described the strike action of UTAG as unfortunate and also appealed to members of UTAG to soften their stand and consider the plight of students.
Commenting on the implementation of the Single Spine Salary Structure (SSSS), the NPP Vice- Chairman stressed the need for the government to take a holistic view of the scheme and address all the shortfalls.
He said if care was not taken, the scheme could lead to series of agitations amongst various aggrieved workers group which could throw the country into anarchy through strikes and demonstrations.
He urged the government of the NDC to sit up by honouring its campaign promises, pointing out that Ghanaians were fed up with the continuous assurances.
“What the government must realise is that the campaign period is over and, therefore, it is time for serious business. We have had enough of the assurances, it is time to do the job” he said.
In a related development, a visit by the Daily Graphic to the Wa campus of the University for Development (UDS) revealed that there were no lectures as students attended to their personal businesses.
While some of the students were spotted in the lecture halls reading, others sat in groups chatting.
Some of the students who spoke to the Daily Graphic also added their voice to the calls on the government to attend to the needs of the UTAG so that they could soon start serious academic work.
They expressed concern about the seemingly war of words from both parties and appealed to them to soften their stands and resolve the issues amicably.