Hold Akufo-Addo responsible for health crisis – Yieleh Chireh

The Member of Parliament (MP) for Wa West Constituency in the Upper West Region, Joseph Yieleh Chireh has expressed worry over the management of health facilities in the country by the Akufo Addo-led administration.

Mr. Yieleh Chireh who is also the ranking Member of Parliament’s Health Committee lashed out at government for its inability to prioritize health by not investing much into the sector in order to salvage the worsening health system.

The health sector is under pressure following emergency cases recorded in various facilities. In some cases, hospital authorities turned away patients because they lacked the capacity to admit such patients as a result of the “No bed syndrome”.

Following the Health Ministry’s directive to hospitals not to turn away patients with emergency cases, family members were compelled to buy plastic chairs to accommodate their sick relatives before they were attended to while others who could not afford same were attended to on the bare floor at the Korle-bu teaching hospital.

But the Wa West legislator in an interview with Accra-based 3FM believes the current state of hospitals are as a result of little or no attention given to it by the current regime.

“We want this country to run properly, people must be held responsible for what they ought to do or they have done, now the blame must first be put on the NPP government, led by Nana Akufo Addo” he said.

He slammed the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP) for failing to deliver on their numerous promises they made to Ghanaians purported to be the key policies in transforming the health sector in the lead up to the 2016 elections, which according to him, formed the basis for being voted into power.

According to Mr. Yieleh Chireh, it is the duty of the President Akufo-Addo to hold responsible the health minister for his inaction that has culminated in the current woes facing the health ministry.

“…why did the president not administer the country without a minister? he has ministers, so it is equally important for the minister to know that, if you have teaching hospitals and a regional hospital, they must be working efficiently” he said.