Government has resolved to build 88 new district hospitals as well as six regional hospitals across the country.
The Effia Nkwanta Hospital in the Western Region will also be rehabilitated to serve its rightful purpose as a regional hospital.
All these are expected to be completed within one year.
“Each of them will be a quality, standard design 100-bed hospital with accommodation for doctors, nurses and other health workers and the intention is to complete them within a year.”
These were made known by President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Adoo on Sunday, April 26 in his periodic update to the nation on measures taken by his government in the fight against coronavirus in Ghana.
Ghana has so far recorded 1,550 cases of the viral disease with 11 deaths.
Six are said to be in critical conditions.
There have been challenges by government in getting isolation centres for persons who are awaiting test results while most of the confirmed cases have to be transported to the few treatment centres in Accra.
President Akufo-Addo said the advent of Covid-19 has exposed the unequal distribution of health facilities in the country as most of the facilities are in Accra, Kumasi and probably one or two regional capitals.
“That is why government has decided to undertake a major investment in our healthcare infrastructure, the largest in our history.”
He, therefore, announced that all the districts in the country without hospitals will have one.
This means Ashanti Region will have 10 new district hospitals, Volta and Central regions will have nine each, Eastern Region will have eight and Greater Accra region will have seven.
The Upper East Region will also have seven, Northern Region will have five, same as Oti, Upper West and Bono regions.
Western North and Western Region will have four each while Ahafo and Savannah will have three each.
Bono East and North-East regions will have two each.
The President also indicated that plans will be put in place to build regional hospitals for each of the new regions.
“We shall make these investments in our healthcare system not because it is going to be easy but because it self-evidently necessary to serve the needs of 21st century Ghana.”
He also announced plans to get a national disease control centre for Ghana with the initial establishment of three centres to respectively serve the northern, middle and southern sectors of the country.
By Emmanuel Kwame Amoh|3news.com|Ghana