The Ghana Physicians and Surgeons Foundation of North America has indicated its willingness to partner its Local Ghanaian counterparts to improve the health delivery regime in the country.
The group, with a membership of some 1,500 specialists, say it aims to leverage the expertise of members, in partnership with the private sector, to make Ghana the first sub-saharan country to have a modernised health care system.
That healthcare system would cater for all health needs of the citizens and people from other parts of the world. This was made known when the Executive of the Foundation called on President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo at the Jubilee House in Accra on Monday.
The call was a follow-up to a discussion the Foundation had with the President when he visited the Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut, last year. Prof. Elijah Paintsil, the First Vice President of the Foundation, told President Akufo-Addo that the group wanted to give back to Ghana what she gave them by nurturing their career.
He expressed unhappiness about the statistics of mortality as a result of lack of specialised healthcare and infrastructureand expressed the hope that through their intervention the shortfalls in critical health delivery in Ghana would be addressed.
"We want to play our part in the development of Ghana. We have acquired skills that Ghana needs, and we need to bring those skills to bear on the healthcare system in the country." Prof. Paintsil, thus, sought the President's intervention to make their vision a reality, saying that their efforts would contribute to the President’s vision of a Ghana Beyond Aid.
"We have been observing from the sidelines and we like your leadership style. We want to share with you a legacy you can leave behind and that is a modernised healthcare," he said. President Akufo-Addo, who was excited about the decision of the Foundation, said: “Your mission is an excellent one, exceptionally postive and progressive."
"I have no difficulty in accepting the offer, because this is something of great benefit and I am very prepared to facilitate the idea because it is useful and beneficial, as it would improve the healthcare situation in the country.”
President Akufo-Addo said the quality of the Ghanaian medical professionals, both home and abroad, was never in doubt and that if those in the diaspora married their vast expertise with their local counterparts, Ghana would have the best healthcare system ever.
"If we could find a vehicle and the way in which to bring together all the synergies to be involved in the concept, it would be of immense benefit to Ghana," he said.