The District Chief Executive (DCE) for the Ellembelle District in the Western Region, Hon. Kwasi Bonzoh has finally embarked on public education on the deadly Coronavirus pandemic in the district.
It would be recalled that some residents in the district were interviewed by GhanaWeb's Western Regional Correspondent Daniel Kaku that since the COVID-19 hit Ghana on March 12, 2020, their DCE has not educated them about it not even to talk about distribution of preventive items.
They described the DCE as an unconcerned leader and other words they used to describe him.
But, surprisingly, the DCE over the weekend stormed the district to sensitize the people about the need to practice personal hygiene.
These are the places the DCE visited on phase one of his campaign; Aiyinasi market, Ebi community, Asasetre community, Esisma GPRTU branch and Eikwe Saint Martin de Porres Hospital.
The DCE is expected to tour the rest of the Communities and other institutions in the district in the coming days.
At the Aiyinasi market, the DCE stationed Veronica buckets at the vantage points of the market to educate them on how to ensure proper handwashing.
The DCE so humbly took his time to demonstrate to the traders and other people how to wash their hands very well. By so doing, he composed a handwashing song to educate them.
Showing how to do it, Hon. Kwasi Bonzoh who is also a Parliamentary Candidate for the governing New Patriotic Party in the area said the palm, in between the fingers, the thumbs, the nails and the back of the hands should be washed thoroughly, adding that tissue paper must be used to clean the hands immediately after the washing and dump the spoiled tissue paper in a dustbin.
The DCE, therefore, seized the opportunity to distribute alcoholic-based hand sanitizers to some traders.
He said there was a need for everybody to apply hand sanitizer but emphasized on frequent handwashing habits.
He said the COVID-19 doesn't have any medicine to cure it but the best way to avoid contracting and spreading the virus is to wash your hands very well and regularly.
"This deadly Coronavirus doesn't have any medicine to cure it but prevention is key, on the issue of hand sanitizers, we are not getting more to buy from the market so let us use soap and water to wash our hands because this virus is afraid of soap and water, as for sanitizer you can use it wherever there's no water", he stated.
He advised the market women who always touch money to observe regular hand washing.
The DCE used a local FM at the market center to educate the residents.
In an exclusive interview with Daniel Kaku, the DCE Kwasi Bonzoh bemoaned how deadly the Coronavirus is and said the campaign against it must be intensified.
"If you get it and care is not taken you may lose your life, that is why we are campaigning seriously, the best form of cure is prevention and ways we will use so that any individual get it so that the person does not spread to many people and bring a problem to Ghanaians", he explained.
"Today's exercise that we have embarked on is to tour some market places and lorry parks to share Veronica buckets, hand sanitizers and tissues so that anybody who wants to protect himself or herself to use it to wash their hands", he added.
Inspecting Isolation Center at Eikwe Saint Martin de Porres Hospital
The District Chief Executive took his campaign to Eikwe Hospital to inspect the Isolation Center there, he, therefore, expressed his happiness about how the management of the hospital had prepared the center.
He promised to forward the Hospital's appeal to government to provide the center with some Personal Preventive Equipment (PPEs) to enhance their work.
"The Hospital is appealing to us for some PPEs such as goggles, gloves, guns, infrared and others so that if they received infected person they can use to look after the person", he said.
The DCE prayed that the Ellembelle District would not record any Coronavirus but said the district has to prepare adequately in advance if anything mysterious happened.
"We have to prepare adequately because nobody knows tomorrow and we are not saying we should get any case but the white people have this to say "if you failed to prepare, you prepared to fail" so we have to prepare so that we can deal with any situation", he stated.
Advice
Hon. Kwasi Bonzoh bemoaned how some people rushed to him at the Aiyinasi market to receive some of the alcoholic-based hand sanitizers.
He advised them to adhere to the social distancing policy to avoid contracting and spreading the deadly Coronavirus pandemic.
He also appealed to church members to observe social distancing to avoid any problem.
"We will appeal to churches, funerals and other gatherings to observe social distancing because we don't have medicine to cure this killer disease so what we have to do is to prevent ourselves", he concluded.
After the demonstration, the DCE allowed some people to practice hand washing and the DCE became happy about how they washed their hands.
They promised to continue at wherever they would go.
Ghana has so far recorded 152 confirmed cases with 5 deaths as of Sunday, March 29, 2020.
