Voter Registration: Health Professional Warns Of Dire Outlook For Health Facilities

Some health professionals and medical doctors are warning that the country's healthcare system may grind to a halt if COVID-19 cases in Ghana continue to increase.

The group has petitioned the Electoral Commission to suspend the ongoing voters' registration exercise due to what they say, is the flagrant disregard for safety protocols.

A member of the group, Dr. Fred Bedzrah, cited as a red flag the projections by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME), an independent population health research centre at the University of Washington.

The institute is indicating that Ghana is on the path to 11,051 coronavirus deaths by October 1.

“We have had more than 12,000 new cases in the last 11 to 12 days. That is worrying. What we don't want is a lot of people being infected at a go,” Dr. Bedzrah said.

“When that happens, the health system is overwhelmed. We are talking about human resources. If you look at our system, we don't even have the numbers by way of clinical care staff.”

“We don't want a situation where the health system is overwhelmed and one of the most fertile grounds for this to happen is what is currently happening at our registration centres.”

In an earlier letter to the EC, the health professionals implored the commission to find a safer away of registering persons to vote.

“Pause the mass registration, figure out safer ways of carrying it out and prevent Ghana from suffering potentially thousands of deaths or continue with the exercise in this form and be remembered by posterity as a leader who supervised an exercise that allowed for the loss of multiple lives,” the group said in its letter to the commission.

Ghana's total case count is now 20,085 as of Sunday, 5 July.

The Greater Accra Region has the most with 10,979 cases, out of which 2,501 are active, whiles the Ashanti Region has a total of 4,244 cases.

The results are from samples that were taken between 16 June and 1 July 2020, according to the GHS.

Also, five more persons have died from the disease taking the total death toll to 122.

The total number of active cases is now 5,093.