The word “swine” rings nasty bells in my ears. Though I have not heard it used for a long time, its usage was often related to something unpleasant.
If you are ever described as a swine, you were being tagged in the most uncomplimentary manner. Any wonder the Oxford Dictionary’s definition of “swine” is captured as “pig, disgusting person, unpleasant or difficult thing.”
In the past few weeks when our media space should have been fully engaged with Christmas and updates on the feel for the festivities, unexpected case of a nasty influenza was reported in town. It occupied all the media space for two weeks. The virus called swine flu or H1N1 had made its debut on the campus of Kumasi Academy (KUMACA) and wreaked havoc, infecting some of the students and killing four of them within a matter of days while 42 more were initially hospitalised.
The sad incident held the entire nation to ransom and the Ministries of Health and Education as well as the Ghana Education Service and the Natioanal Health Service running in search for solutions. It sent parents, students and school officials confused and scared.
True to its name, experts tell us that the swine in the flu is a very unpleasant and contagious respiratory disease that causes symptoms of seasonal influenza. It attacks with fierce vengeance and within days the results are shattering if no interventions are made.
So far, the Ministry of Health and the Ghana Health Service have moved swiftly to contain the spread of the virus. The World Health Organization (WHO) quickly moved to the scene to lend its expertise to the team of medical experts who worked around the clock to get to the bottom of it all. By the end of the second week, the Ministry of Health had made moves to source supplies of anti-viral as well as vaccines from Switzerland to boost immunisation and help contain infection.
Regrettably, it has taken the unfortunate deaths of the four KUMACA students for the Ministry of Health to realise the urgency of general immunisation, especially in our school children. As a way of life, immunisation in our basic and secondary schools should be a norm, especially in deprived communities.
A couple of weeks ago, Today newspaper reported in its 11th December edition that the Ashanti Regional Health Director of the Ghana Health Service had said on a Kumasi-based local FM radio that in preventing children from the Region getting the virus, the health directorate was taking steps to vaccinate students in second cycle institutions against the deadly swine flu. Were these steps too little too late?
The Ashanti Regional Health Directorate has informed us that the infection rate recorded at the Academy during the crisis time was 85 students within 10 days (between November 29 and December 8). This was established after a series of tests were conducted by the Noguchi Memorial Institute for Medical Research.
To save a nation running helter-skelter over such health crisis, especially where it involves the lives of children, it makes a lot of meaning for the Ghana Health Service and the Ghana Education Service to put heads together and strategise quickly for the way forward. The two would need to strengthen and empower school health directorates to carry out their core mandates in our schools since a sound mind rests in a healthy body.
If we had a working school health directorate in place, we did not have to wait for an outbreak of an H1N1, meningitis, chicken pox or any seasonal viruses to break out, put the lives of children at risk before we run for cover. In this age of many manufacturers eager to promote their businesses and their products, one can foresee companies coming forward to sponsor such worthy causes like schools immunisation.
Elsewhere, the school health system is seen as crucial and so efforts are put into it to make it very functional. They follow up on childhood immunisations and ensure every child in school went through the mandatory immunisations and give boosters where necessary.
Not only that, school health personnel, led by qualified Nurses, visits schools in their jurisdictions often to do health inspections, make referrals for children who need to see a Doctor, a specialist or to go to a hospital.
Schools may have sick-bays but we know that where they exist, in most cases, they are not manned by qualified personnel.
It is time for us to learn from the unfortunate KUMACA health scare and put measures in place to take care of the health needs of our school children once they leave home and put in the custody and care of our educational authorities.
Ghana beyond aids means that we need to be proactive, take charge and be on top of issues. We have experts we can rely on if only we can look far beyond the now. And so, there we were last week with our Health Minister abandoning everything else to go to Switzerland to look for emergency supply of anti-viral and vaccines to tackle H1N1. Even that did not arrive at the time they were expected in the country. One is not sure whether the vaccines are in now.
So, while we have been waiting for the vaccines and more anti-viral to be airlifted into the country, can someone tell us how safe we all are. Has the virus evaporated or gone into hibernation only to surprise us later? What a way to go as everyone is put on edge by no other than a mere swine.
Reality Zone
-With Vicky WIREKO-ANDOH (vicky.wireko-andoh@todaygh.com)