54 pregnant women die in Eastern Region

Koforidua, Oct. 23, GNA- Fifty-four women in the Eastern Region died through pregnancy related complications within the first half of this year.

This was disclosed by the Eastern Region Director of Health Services, Dr. Ebenezer Appiah-Denkyira at a stakeholders meeting of the New Juaben District Mutual Health Scheme at Koforidua on Tuesday.

He said this was a serious development and everybody should show concern because potential mothers suffer from issues, which need not cause death.

Dr. Appiah Denkyira said the Regional Directorate of the Ghana Health Service (GHS) was not happy about what is happening in most of the hospitals in the region because when one gets to a hospital at odd hours, there is no medical officer to attend to patients when the hospitals are supposed to operate for 24 hours.

He said "sometimes the attitude of some health workers at the health institutions in the region are not something that one should be happy about" and hoped that the Health Insurance Schemes (HIS) would help change the negative attitudes.

Dr Appiah-Denkyira called on the health insurance scheme to negotiate for quality services at the various health institutions and called on health authorities to give priority attention to health prevention to enable them to save more money.

The New Juaben Municipal Chief Executive, Nana Adjei Boateng observed that fortunate for the country, the concerns raised about the Health Insurance Act, was not total rejection but how to fund the scheme.

He said majority of Ghanaians accept the scheme as a better alternative to the "cash and carry" system.

Dr Dominic Quaye, the Municipal Director of Health Services called for the formation of Association of Mutual Health Insurance Schemes as a way of merging existing scheme into one scheme.

Daasebre Professor Oti Boateng, Paramount Chief of the New Juaben Traditional Area, who chaired the meeting, called for efforts to enable the people to own the scheme and contribute towards its success. He said the New Juaben Traditional Council was prepared to forge a partnership with the Municipal Assembly to ensure environmental cleanliness of the Municipality through frequent community clean-up exercises.