The people of Asitey in the Lower Manya Krobo Constituency of the Eastern Region can now heave a sigh of relief to access healthcare at a convenient facility, thanks to the benevolence of the Member of Parliament for the area.
Honorable Ebenezer Okletey Terlabi on Tuesday commissioned a new health center in the community with essential medical equipment and supplies to boost healthcare delivery in the area.
The new facility replaces the previous one housed in a private residential property which caused a lot of inconveniences for both health seekers and personnel due to a lack of adequate space to accommodate its operations.
The new facility valued at GH¢430,000, according to the lawmaker, forms part of his efforts to ensure access to quality health care delivery in the area.
According to Mr. Terlabi, the center was built with accumulated savings from the MP’s Common Fund and “other sources.”
The second phase of the project is expected to provide accommodation facilities for the resident midwife and other staff of the facility.
The facilities will offer various services including antennal, post-natal, delivery, general OPD, child welfare, clinical care, adolescent and reproductive healthcare, and family planning, among other services.
Though works on the facility were supposed to have been completed by the contractors, AB-Ziko four months after grounds were broken for commencement works in June, 2019, this could not be achieved.
The legislator explaining the cause of the delay said resources available for the project were directed to address viral infections in some SHSs and alternative sources of funding for the project other than his common fund were also affected by the COVID-19 hence the donors’ inability to provide the needed funds on time.
The provision of the new facility means expectant mothers will no longer travel to the Atua or Agomanya hospitals for deliveries.
Speaking to the media, the three-term lawmaker noted that his aim to was bring healthcare provision close to the people to save them the trouble of travelling over long distances for such services.
“One thing we are all promoting is primary healthcare and one critical thing is that the health centers must be close to the communities because people do not have to travel far to access secondary or tertiary centers for health delivery,” said the MP, adding that Asitey needed a permanent health delivery facility rather than operating from a rented place.
Municipal Health Director for Lower Manya Krobo, Mr. Bismark Sarkodie in his speech said the Directorate in 2009 created the Asitey Sub-Municipal Health Team to string the healthcare needs of the people in Asitey and surrounding communities to enhance their productivity in the community.
He furthered that the Municipal Health Directorate will also lobby for other categories of staff such as physician assistants to augment the staff strength in the facility.
“It is our mandate to provide quality and affordable healthcare for the citizenry so that the national health policy and Ghana’s road map for attaining Universal Health Coverage are realized,” he noted.
The health director appealed to the local Assembly and philanthropists to provide a bungalow to house the midwives who are required to provide deliveries, especially at night.
In-charge and midwife at the center, Madam Evelyn Doku in an interview expressed gratitude to the lawmaker and recounted the several difficulties that hindered the smooth operations of health personnel at the previous place.
She said, “Looking at the previous place where we were not able to do so much, we were not able to deliver quality healthcare to our patients but here, we are happy because we can render a lot of services. Delivery is a major task and that place we were not doing it but this place, we’ll do it perfectly,” she said but ended with an appeal for more delivery beds to assist them.
She pleaded, “The only challenge is that delivery beds and other beds, we don’t have…so we’ll only appeal if we can have some philanthropists who can help to get us this equipment.”
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The health facility was funded from the MPs Common Fund