President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo yesterday inspected ongoing works on the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) Treatment Centre being developed at Pantang in the Greater Accra Region.
Sponsored by the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) as a corporate social responsibility project, the centre is expected to be converted into an Infectious Disease Centre post COVID-19.
While commending the ECG and the Ministry of Health for coming together to execute the project, he said the gap in the country’s health infrastructure became apparent when the pandemic was first recorded earlier this year.
As a result, President Akufo-Addo said the government introduced the Agenda 111 which includes the construction of seven new regional hospitals and a number of district hospitals and other health facilities.
The purpose of the Agenda 111 is to beef up the country’s health infrastructure to improve access to healthcare and ensure that the country is adequately prepared to deal with any pandemic or infectious disease in the future, he said.
“We need to help ourselves; nobody will come and help us,” he said and expressed optimism that the COVID-19 Treatment Centre, when completed, would be a good addition to the country’s health infrastructure.
President Akufo-Addo appealed to medical practitioners and other staff who would be working at the centre to take good care of the facilities there.
The Minister of Health, Kwaku Agyeman-Manu, said the facility is being developed from a building which was originally meant for the Ghana Health Service but abandoned after the Kufuor Administration left office in 2009.
He thanked the ECG for supporting the government to redevelop the facility.
BY YAW KYEI