Director, Public Health urges Ghanaians to improve on their personal hygiene

Dr Franklin Asiedu-Bekoe (left), Director, Public Health, GHS; Prof. Titus Beyuo (2nd from left), Member of the Parliamentary Select Committee on Health, and Dr Lawrence Ofori Boadu (right), Director, Institutional Care Division, GHS, in a discussion at the event. Picture: EDNA SALVO KOTEY

The Director of the Public Health Division of the Ghana Health Service (GHS) , Dr Franklin Asiedu-Bekoe, has urged Ghanaians to improve on their personal hygiene as the rainy season begins.

He explained that the onset of the rains increased the risk of contracting cholera, and that it was, therefore, important to improve standard of personal hygiene such as washing of the hands regularly with soap under running water and eating hot meals in order to reduce that risk.

Dr Asiedu-Bekoe said this in an interview with journalists on the cholera situation in the country on the sidelines of a water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) advocacy event organised by the GHS in Accra.

The event, among others, sought to bring to the fore the current situation of WASH in health facilities and how they could be improved.

Cholera situation

On the current cholera situation in the country, Dr Asiedu-Bekoe said since the latter part of last year to a few weeks ago, the country was having cases. However, as of May 6, there had not been any reported case but the service had not declared the outbreak over.

“We don’t have any confirmed case in any other region in the country.

What is obvious is that the risk factors still exist. It’s about access to potable water, it’s about insanitary conditions, and then ensuring that we have good personal hygiene,” he said.

Addressing Parliament on February 18, the Minister of Health, Kwabena Mintah Akandoh, said the country had recorded 719 confirmed cases of cholera and 49 deaths as of February 13, 2025.

He stated that the outbreak, which began in October 2024 in Ada West in the Greater Accra Region, had spread to multiple regions, including Central, Western, Ashanti and Eastern.
Central Region had been the hardest hit, particularly in the districts of Agona West and Effutu.

Those areas, explained the minister, had reported 133 new cases in the past week alone, with 23 hospital admissions and two fatalities.

Cholera

Cholera is primarily linked to insufficient access to safe water and proper sanitation and can be fatal if not treated promptly.

It is spread through the eating of contaminated food or water and less frequently from person to person because of poor hygiene. Inadequate access to safe water and poor sanitation are major risk factors to the spread of cholera.

Symptoms include watery diarrhoea, vomiting and leg cramp. These symptoms, according to UNICEF Ghana, can lead to rapid loss of bodily fluids and dehydration.