‘Lash us if we mismanage KATH Mother & Baby Unit’ – Health Minister

General News of Saturday, 20 January 2018

Source: Myjoyonline.com

2018-01-20

Agyemang ManuHealth Minister, Kwaku Agyeman-Manu

Health Minister, Kwaku Agyemang Manu, has promised to ensure that a newly built KATH Mother & Baby Unit does not suffer the fate of Ghana’s poor maintenance culture.

“If we are not able to make very good use of [this], I think we will come to you with canes for you to lash us,” the Minister said at the commissioning of the facility built from a collaborative effort of the Rebecca Akufo-Addo Foundation and the Multimedia Group Ltd.

Poor maintenance, he feared, could kill the “spirit and vim of the First Lady” assuring that he will ask for at least, quarterly reports on the state of the facility.

The Minister, visibly ecstatic, appeared to run out of superlatives for the initiative conceived after a riveting documentary by Joy News’ Seth Kwame Boateng.

“We cannot hide our joy…for this wonderful, marvelous” facility, the Health Minister said.

“What you are witnessing this morning seems to be the first very major significant project donated to the Health sector by the Rebecca Foundation,” he said.

At least, three women can have a cesarean section at the same time at the KATH Mother and Baby Unit.

In the Joy News documentary ‘Next To Die’, a cot meant for one baby is shared by as many as eight newborns. A father testified after he lost two babies when his wife delivered at the hospital in 2013, 2014 and 2016 respectively.

A KATH Maternity Block which began in 1974 had stalled for more than 40 years. It would cost more than $70m to finish and furnish the more than a 1,000-bed facility.

The Rebecca Foundation found it pragmatic to build immediately a less costly 10million cedi facility.

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