‘Superstition associated with diseases threatens healthcare delivery’ - Obeng Amoako

Mr Anderson Obeng Amoako, the Disease Control Officer, Ada-East District, has called for enhanced education and sensitization to counter misconceptions and myths surrounding some diseases, which threaten healthcare delivery.

He noted that inadequate information was a major cause of the spread of diseases and urged stakeholders to intensify awareness to overcome these beliefs to improve healthcare.

Mr Amoako, in an interview with the Ghana News Agency, at Ada in the Greater Accra Region, said due to superstitions associated with some diseases, family members of the sick preferred to visit shrines and churches for healing instead of seeking health care at the hospitals.

“It is only when the sick person’s condition gets worse at these shrines and churches before the family rushes to the hospital when it is almost too late to save,” he noted.

Most of these “superstitious” diseases could have easily been controlled at the initial stage, but often time was wasted at the prayer camp to no avail, he said.

“When we delay by moving from one prayer camp to the other or from one traditional healer to the other, we only end up complicating the health condition of the sick person”.

Mr Amoako cited COVID-19 as an example, which some people associated with superstition, hence they refused to take the vaccines.

He added that Mpox was also being described as a form of superstitious or mystic sickness, based on which people refused to take precautions.

He advised that health messages must be persuasive with a combination of various techniques to suit the specific needs of the people and encourage them to patronise health facilities for solutions to ailments.

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