Central Region records 186 cholera cases
The Central Regional Health Directorate, last year, recorded 186 cholera cases with eight deaths.
Out of the number, the Komenda-Edina-Eguafo-Abrem (KEEA) Municipality recorded 32 cases with six deaths.
Mr Matthew Ahwireng, Regional Health Promotion Officer, made this known on Tuesday at the regional launch of the Global Hand Washing Day at Kokwaado-Dompoase, near Kissi in the KEEA Municipality.
The Global Hand Washing Day, which is celebrated on October 15 every year, is to motivate and mobilise people to wash their hands with soap.
The day, which is sponsored by UNICEF, is also to create awareness of hand washing with soap as a key approach to disease prevention.
Mr Ahwireng said poor sanitation remained one of the major causes of the increasing incidence of diarrheoa among children under five and adult population across the Central Region.
According to him, a total of 103,159 diarrheoa cases were recorded last year and 54,749 cases was recorded from January to June this year.
Mr Ahwireng said 257,658 respiratory diseases were recorded last year with 130,191 cases recorded from January to June this year.
He said to reduce the situation there was the need for a consented effort by all to observe proper hygienic practices.
Mr Ahwireng said it was in view of this that the Kokwaado Community was selected for the regional launch so as to create awareness on sanitation and promote the continuous practice of hand washing with soap since the community did not have a public toilet for visitors and for community use.
He urged the people to maintain the five principles of hand washing with soap which include washing of hands before meals, before the preparation food, after using the toilet, before feeding a child and after cleaning a child.
He said those principles should be part of their values to ensure that their children grew up to be ambassadors of the message on hand washing with soap with clean water at all times.
Mr Ahwireng encouraged them to use Oral Rehydration Salts (ORS) and Zinc tablets to manage diarrheoa cases.
Mr Ben Adjei, District Disease Control Officer, underscored the importance of hand washing with clean water and soap and urged all families to educate their children to develop the habit of washing their hands regularly.
He said this would help reduce the number of visits to health centres and also enable them to save money and time.
He said unclean hands could cause upper respiratory system infection as well as eye infections among children and urged them to practice personal hygiene.
The programme was started by a float of school pupils who carried placards some of which read; “Take ORS and Zinc tablets to manage diarrheoa,” “Wash your hands before you eat,” “Clean hands for good life,” “Wash your hands with soap and clean water,” and “Diarrheoa can kill”.
Source: GNA