Parliament summons Alex Dodoo over 'Ebola attack'

Ghana’s Parliament has summoned Prof Alex Dodoo of the School of Medicine and Dentistry of the University of Ghana before its Privileges Committee for allegedly attacking MPs over the botched Ebola vaccines trial in Hohoe.

Prof. Dodoo in a media interview last week asked the lawmakers to apologise to Ghanaians for their “incorrect, misleading and unfounded” comments on the Ebola vaccines trial.

The Minister of Health, Alex Segbefia, suspended the proposed Ebola vaccines trial scheduled to take place in Hohoe in the Volta region after a public uproar followed Starrfmonline.com’s investigations on the exercise.

Prof. Dodoo said it was a shame that MPs were asking fundamental questions on the floor of the House such as whether the trial had been performed on mice and chimpanzee when the Parliamentary Select Committee on Health could have easily obtained more clarity on the issue from the Food and Drugs Authority (FDA), which has been mandated to undertake such trials.

He said if this initial test had not been done, the trial would not have been authorised to reach its current stage where it was to be tested on humans.

“Ghana’s image and ability to develop would be damaged because no pharmaceutical company will come to the country as it appears that our laws are arbitrarily applied,” he said. ““When Ghana was hit with the H1N1, we begged other countries for vaccines.”

His comments have not gone down well with the House, prompting the Speaker to haul him before the Chamber, Starr News’ Kobby Gomez Mensah has reported.

“The Speaker said though in such matters he had been reluctant in referring members of the public to the committee, in this particular matter, the House was on the same wavelength as the Ghana Academy of Arts and Sciences,” Mensah said.

“The Speaker has also directed the Health Committee to engage the Academy over the Ebola vaccine trial and inform the House accordingly.”

Meanwhile, the Ministry of Health will from Thursday, June 18 begin a sensitisation exercise in the Greater Accra region on the impending Ebola vaccine clinical trial.

The public education will subsequently be carried out in the Volta, Brong Ahafo and the Upper East regions, the Health Minister Alex Segbefia told Parliament, Tuesday.

The exercise is aimed at disabusing the minds of Ghanaians against the perception that the vaccine trial will end up spreading the Ebola virus in Ghana.