The walk which was under the theme; ‘Giving hope to the ad­dicted,’ started at exactly 6:30am from Mallam junction through to the principal streets of the Mallam-Gbawe road and finally converged at Gbawe Chief ’s pal­

 ace in Accra.

Some of the placards displayed by participants read “There is hope for people with addiction,” “shisha is harmful,” “tramadol kills, stay away,” “flee fornication,” “blue cross, the place of hope for people with addiction,” and among others.

Others were also seen giving out flyers on drug abuse, its pre­vention and cure while they walk on the principal streets of the Mallam-Gbawe road.

The General Secretary of the Blue Cross Ghana, Reverend Patrick Adjei Acheampong, in an interview with the media said the programme formed part of the climax of the organisation’s flagship project dubbed ‘The Blue Cross Self Help (BC-SH),’ designed to help stem the tide of alcohol and other substances-re­lated issues in the country.

He said studies on the self-help project showed that without an additional therapeutic measures, the living situation of participants stabilised significantly from 20-25 per cent.

Reverend Acheampong said the project was currently being pilot­ed at the Gbawe Methodist Park with about 26 clients of which 15 had been resuscitated and were doing well.

“If you have people with addiction there’s hope for them. Family members are suffering, they don’t know where to go since rehab centres are costly so this is to show them the way to where they can find hope,” he added.

Stephen Kwasi Nyarko, a re­covered addicted who shared his success story with the Ghanaian Times, said he was a drunkard and drug pusher for over 20 years but with the help of the Blue Cross Ghana, his life had been trans­formed and could be recognised by family members now.

Martha Yeboah, another recov­ered addicted, said she became a drunkard and nuisance to her family when a friend introduced her to alcohol after she lost her husband but with the intervention of Blue Cross Ghana’s project, her life had been totally trans­formed and could now take care of her children.

The Blue Cross Ghana is affiliated to the International Blue Cross, a Swiss-based Interna­tional Christian Organisation whose business is the fight against alcohol and other substance abuse across the world.

The organisation works as a Specialised Ministry under the Mission and Evangelism Depart­ment of the Presbyterian Church of Ghana and has done a lot in this field over the years.