UE/R: SOCO PROJECT FACILITATORS URGED TO WORK HARD FOR THE SUCCESS OF THE PROJECT – DCE NABDAM
By Raymond Batasia Wegwi – Tamale District Communications.
The Catholic Relief Services (CRS) ,with funding from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter- Day Saints (LDS) has handed over 20 Modified Motor -Tricycle Ambulances to the Holistic Opportunities for Positive Engagement in Maternal and Child Health (HOPE -MCH) project, in Tamale, in the Northern Region . The project is being implemented across the 10 Districts in the Upper East, Savannah, North East and the Northern Regions, for over 250,000 individuals, improving services in 100 health facilities across the 4 targeted Regions.
In her opening remarks in well attended program, the country representative of CRS, Madam Abena Amedormey, said this initiative, directly addresses one of the most critical issues, contributing to high maternal and newborn mortality rates in rural Ghana, the delay in accessing health services, adding that with this help,they have taken decisive step forward in their mission to save precious lives . She expressed her sincerest gratitude to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter- Day Saints for their generous financial support for the project and on behalf of the donors and CRS, she encouraged the Ghana Health Service (GHS), National Ambulance Service (NAS), to maximize the potential of the Ambulances to realize the project objective of enhancing maternal and child health in northern Ghana.
The CRS’s program manager, Mr Haliq Adam, who took the participants through the project update presentation ,stated that, the one year contract was signed in September,2024 with all the stakeholders and the have trained the required health workers, especially the midwives and provided them with logistics and was delighted with the success rate so far, and very optimistic that, with the provisions of the Ambulances, health services delivery will improve drastically in beneficiary communities.
Mr. Israel Otto, who represented The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter- Day Saints, the donors, intemated, that the Church’s humanitarian work commenced in the 1980s in responding to the Ethiopian famine, where the leaders of the church announced a worldwide fast to raise some 6 million US dollars to support the victims. According to him, the church has since scaled up its humanitarian interventions across the globe especially in maternal and child health , Women and Youth development and in Ghana, this is achieved through the funding support to the HOPE -MCH project, where a group of nonprofit organizations are collaborating to implement this important program, aligned with the Sustainable Development Goal 3, which employs the need to ensure healthy lives and promote well being for all ages; with reducing global maternal ratio and ending preventable deaths of newborns and children under 5 years. He expressed his gratitude to the CRS and GHS, for the partnership, and assured them of the Church’s unflinching continue support to them, and appealed to them to handle the MMTAs well to derived their maximum utilization.
The Nabdam District Director of GHS in the Upper East Region, Madam Maria Mahama, on behalf of the Regional Director, was very delightful to be one of the beneficiary Region for the HOPE -MCH project, and other numerous interventions ongoing there, to improve health delivery. She underscored that, access to emergency transport is still a challenge in most rural communities and this support will undoubtedly, strengthen their emergency referral system in the project districts, knowing the critical role that emergency medical services play in saving lives, stressing that these tricycle Ambulances will help bridge the gap in healthcare across, ensuring that Women and children received timely and quality medical attention and urged all the District Directors to make good use of the MMTAs and ensure proper maintenance and thanked CRS especially The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter- Day Saints for the support.
Dr. Foster Ansong-Bridjan , Director of operations, National Ambulance Service (NAS), described the project as innovative and lives saving intervention, that is very helpful to the remote and underserved areas as access to emergency care remains a major challenge in the rural areas especially where the traditional Ambulances themselves are struggling to cope with the poor roads network. He commended CRS and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter- Day Saints for their support, emphasising that no life should be lost due to delays in transporting a person to a health facility and admonished his people to handle them according to the purpose of which they have been provided for, and expressed his hope that, this collaboration will inspired further partnership in future.
The Tamale District president, Doku in his concluding remarks, appealed to the beneficiary communities to own the project and handle the equipment well to enable them get another support from the church when the need arises.
