Mrs Harriet Nuamah Agyeman, a Senior Programs Officer at Send Ghana has called on Health Directorates to capitalise on the 0.5 District Assembly Common Fund(DACF)earmarked for malaria activities in their respective metropolitan, municipalities and districts.

She advised that it was essential to send their programmes on malaria activities ahead of time so that as soon as the common fund was released, their quota would be given to enable them undertake their activities.

Mrs Agyeman made this statement at the District level dialogue and validation of report on the 0.5 percent DACF for malaria and malaria related expenditure in the Lower Manya municipality.

The project was under the auspices of Send Ghana in collaboration with Penplusbyte, GNA and is geared towards ensuring that people had access to quality healthcare.

The project dubbed ''People for Health'' seeks to address health issues such as HIV and AIDS, Malaria, Water and Sanitation, Hygiene and Nutrition.

She said failure to submit programmes on time would make the assemblies continue to utilise the funds to the detriment of malaria related programmes and activities.

Mrs Agyeman then called for the need as stakeholders to work towards getting the funds used for malaria related activities.

She called on stakeholders such as traditional leaders, citizens, media who have knowledge on the 0.5 DACF allocated to malaria related programmes to prompt the health directorates after receiving the funds.

Madam Ethel Henyo, the Lower Manya Municipal Health Information Officer said the municipality recorded a total of 3,344 malaria cases in 2020 representing 6.5 percent of Out Patient Department (OPD) cases slightly above that of the previous year.

She said in 2019, a total of 2,947 cases of malaria were recorded, representing 3.4percent of OPD cases, while, 2018 recorded a total of 3,392 cases representing 5.8 percent of OPD cases.