Malaria admission among children under five also declined from 3.6 per cent to 3.2 per cent, while the burden index also dropped from 53, 879 to 49, 987.

Ms Wilhelmina Tiwaah Duah, the Municipal Director of Health Services, announced this when the Goldfields Ghana Foundation (GFGF), in collaboration with the Health Directorate and the Assembly, observed the World Malaria Day with students of the Tarkwa Senior High School on Tuesday.

The year’s theme was: “Accelerating the fight against malaria for more equitable wealth”.
Ms Duah said everyone had a role to play to reduce the burden of malaria, adding that in Ghana and (Western Region not an exception), malaria remained first on the top 10 OPD attendance.

“Achieving health equity lies in the heart of our effort, it requires every individual regardless of his or her social economic status or geographical location to have access to tools and intervention whenever the need arises,” she said.

“It demands that we address the underlying factors that perpetrate health facility disparity such that anyone who visits the health facility has equal care and equal intervention.”

Some of those disparities were due to inadequate healthcare infrastructure, lack of education and poverty, she said.

The Directorate, therefore, hoped to improve upon its diagnostics and laboratory services to help identify people who had the disease.

“Recently we have witnessed shortages in our Rapid Diagnostic Test (RBT) although microscopy is the gold standard. Therefore, it is important that we have access to laboratories in all our major health facilities to improve upon detection,” Ms Duah said.

Out of the eight health centres, only two could boast of functional laboratory services, she noted, and called on all to help change the trend.

“We want to draw the attention of the Goldfields Ghana Foundation to the New Atuabo health centre as it also needs a face lift and a functional laboratory.’’

Ms Duah said the pattern of mosquitoes was also changing as they were becoming adaptable, having more outdoor bites than indoor bites, and aside the use of mosquito nets, the people should make use of repellents and protective clothing on the outside.

She commended the Assembly, GoldFields Ghana Limited, and AngloGold Ashanti Iduapriem Mine, for supporting to eliminate malaria in the municipality through the larval source management and indoor residual spraying.

Ms Duah expressed gratitude to the staff for educating the residents on the disease through counseling at the OPD and community engagement.

The Executive Secretary of GFGF, Mr Abdel Razak Yakubu, said since the inception of the Foundation, a total of 6.2 million dollars had been invested in the health sector.

He assured Ghanaians that the Foundation would continue to support the health sector to protect the country’s human resource.

Mr Benjamin Kessie, the Municipal Chief Executive of Tarkwa Nsuaem, commended the GFGF for assisting the country’s health sector and other important areas in the municipality and beyond.

The Headmaster of Tarkwa Senior High School, Mr George Oduro, lauded the Organisers for extending the educative programme to the campus and charged the students to be ambassadors of malaria.

The GFGF presented 1000 mosquito repellents to be distributed to the students, who participated in a quiz competition among the various houses of the school.