2,545 persons vaccinated against yellow fever in the Upper West Region

A total of 2,545 persons aged six months to 60 years have been vaccinated against yellow fever in some communities in the Sissala West and Wa East districts of the Upper West Region.

The vaccination followed an outbreak of the disease in the two districts which had already claimed five lives.

The Regional Director for Health Services, Dr. Damien Punguyire, who made this known during a media briefing at Wa yesterday said the Ghana Health Service (GHS) was seeking to vaccinate a total of 6,909 persons in the affected areas and said so far 38 percent of the target population had been covered.

He explained that yellow fever was an acute hemorrhagic disease that was transmitted by affected mosquitoes and said it was normally accompanied by jaundice, hence the tag “yellow”.

Dr Punguyire stated that symptoms of the disease included headache, nausea, jaundice, among others and patients who suffered the condition could get very serious complications and die after seven to 10 days of contracting the disease.

He used the opportunity to call on residents in affected communities to avail themselves for vaccination and also report to the health center on time if they felt sick, adding a caution for them to avoid getting bitten by mosquitoes.

Touching on the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, the health director announced that the Food and Drugs Authority (FDA) had approved Pfizer vaccines for children aged 15 years and above and said the GHS would commence vaccination for children within the age bracket next week.

“We hope to administer the vaccines to the children before they go home for the Christmas break and we know most of them would be found in the schools so that would be our first port of call,” he said.

He stated that so far a total of 91,017 adults had received vaccination against the COVID-19 virus in the region, saying the figure represented 19 percent of the target population by the GHS.

Dr Punguyire explained that although the region had not recorded any cases recently, it was still necessary to ensure strict compliance to the safety protocols and timely administration of vaccines.

“The region recorded 745 cases from March 2020 to October 2021 out of which 36 lives were lost to the COVID-19 pandemic; so we need to take seriously the vaccination exercises to ensure that everyone was better protected from the virus,” he added and appealed to residents to visit the various vaccination centres for their dose.