Deaths from CSM outbreak up north ‘tragic’ – Akufo-Addo

President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo is unhappy with recent Cerebrospinal Meningitis (CSM) related deaths recorded in the country.

He has thus made a case for the tackling of CSM head-on to prevent such deaths in the wake of the Coronavirus pandemic.

“The recent, tragic CSM outbreak, with over forty (40) deaths, has reaffirmed the need for ready access to such infectious disease control centres, even though, in our time, nobody should die of the disease. Early reporting is what is required, and I implore everybody to heed this call,’ the president said.

President Akufo-Addo made the remark on Sunday when he addressed the nation on measures put in place by the government to curb the spread of the Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in Ghana.

Meningitis in the Northern part of Ghana

The Upper West Region has recorded 40 deaths from the disease out of about 258 confirmed cases in the region.

CSM-related deaths have also been recorded in the Upper East Region.

So far over 400 CSM cases have been recorded in the regions up north.

The Ghana Health Service (GHS) recently attributed the challenges with tackling the disease to the lack of financial resources.

A team of experts were on Thursday, April 16, 2020, dispatched to the Upper West Region to help fight the CSM cases.

New strain of CSM

The Ghana Health Service (GHS) had disclosed that the current outbreak of Meningitis in the Upper West Region is caused by a new strain of bacteria that has no vaccine.

The Ghana Health Service, however, said even though there is no vaccine for this strain causing the outbreak, there is an effective treatment upon early reporting and initiation of the said treatment.

Infectious disease control centres

While addressing the nation, President Akufo-Addo also made the case for the need for more infectious disease control centres across the country.

“We are going to beef up our existing laboratories, and establish new ones across every region for testing. We will establish three (3) infectious disease control centres for each of the zones of our country, i.e. Coastal, Middle Belt and Northern, with the overall objective of setting up a Ghana Centre for Disease Control,” he added.

 

 

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