7,646 KATH frontline workers vaccinated against COVID-19

Following the intervention of the government to secure 600,000 doses of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine manufactured by the Serum Institute of India under the COVID-19 Vaccine Global Access (COVAX), a total of 7,646 individuals of the Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital (KATH) have successfully been vaccinated against COVID-19, under the first phase of the nationwide exercise.

Those vaccinated so far comprise workers of the health facility, including Nation Builders Corps (NABCO) and National Service personnel, staff of the National Ambulance Service, students and staff of the School of Medicines and Dentistry of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST).

Other beneficiaries of the vaccination exercise are students and staff of the Kumasi Nursing and Midwifery Training College and some vulnerable clients of the hospital.

Dr. Oheneba Owusu-Danso, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the hospital, who announced this at the KATH 2020 Annual Performance Review Conference in Kumasi last week Wednesday, thanked the Nana Akufo-Addo-led government for the life-saving interventions.

The CEO further commended the Ministry of Health (MoH) for supporting the hospital with Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) to reduce the supply and expenditure burden of the hospital in the face of the COVD-19 pestilence.

According to the KATH head, the Ministry of Health supplied 189,000 surgical facemasks, 290,000 cloth face masks; 105,115 N95 respiratory masks; 26,300 coveralls, 26,266 examination gloves and 15,800 face shields, among others as at December 31, 2020.

Dr. Owusu-Danso said the interventions reduced the financial burden of the hospital from loss of revenue from the COVID-19 restrictions.

He, however, bemoaned the loss of one staff to COVID-19, and 368 affected by the disease in the effort to provide the best of care for COVID-19 and other patients during the pandemic.

The KATH CEO also mentioned that the hospital witnessed a marked reduction in the number of maternal deaths in its operations during the year under review, and attributed the marked improvement to the construction of the Mother Baby Unit by the First Lady, Mrs. Rebecca Akufo-Addo, through the Rebecca Foundation, and the enhanced operational capacity of the National Ambulance Service for prompt and improved quality care.

He said the hospital recorded a reduction in maternal deaths, from 111 in 2019 to 53 in 2020, which translates into a maternal death ratio decline of 1,575 per 100,000 live births in 2019 to 847 per 100,000 live births in 2020, the lowest in the last five years.

Dr. Eric K. Nyedu, Chief Executive Officer of the Cape Coast Teaching Hospital, sharing in the experience of KATH increased expenditure against low revenue during the COVID-19 pandemic, recommended that health institutions should find ways of handling the situation by generating revenue to operate empty hospitals as sig a sign of healthy society without necessarily looking up to high attendance to raise revenue.

“A health facilitate full of patients in order to generate revenue should not be the case”, he noted

The Ashanti Regional Minister, Simon Osei Mensah who presided over the review conference appealed to well-meaning individuals and corporate organisations to support KATH in anticipation of the second wave of COVID-19 said to be more deadly.

He noted that KATH with its central location has a great burden as it receives referrals from all over the country.

The Minister assured that the government is making frantic efforts to ensure the completion of other health facilities in the region and disclosed that Ashanti might benefit from 50 facilities under the government’s Agenda 111.

Mr. Osei Mensah advised those qualified to take the vaccine to disabuse their minds about the ill advice by detractors and go in for the vaccination.

The Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital, Tamale Teaching Hospital and Ho Teaching Hospitals  were respectively represented by Dr. Opoku Ware Ampomah (CEO), Dr. Adam Atiku (Medical Director) and Dr. Lord Graceful Mensah (Acting Director of  Health Services at the  KATH Performance Review Conference.

Dr. Minuru Alhassan, the Director of Administration, delivering a solidarity message on behalf of the Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital noted that teaching hospitals are a force to reckon with and commended KATH for the feat so far achieved in the face of COVID-19.

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