13 cases of H1N1 influenza recorded

CASES of H1N1 influenza in Ghana have increased gradually from the initial two patients recorded on August 6, this year, to 13 currently.
Fortunately, no deaths have so far been recorded but health professionals have cautioned against complacency and advised that precautionary measures should be taken seriously to prevent an outbreak of the pandemic in the country.
While 10 of the victims have been treated and cleared of the presence of any virus, the last three are undergoing treatment at home.
Addressing heads and teachers of both private and public schools at the basic level in the Greater Accra Region, the Director of Public Health of the Ghana Health Service (GHS), Dr Joseph Amankwah, said schools were considered a high-risk area because of the large numbers of people involved. For that reason, he said all efforts must be made to prevent the disease.
The one-day programme which had the theme "Institutional preparedness to mitigate the impact of the pandemic influenza (H1N1) outbreaks in schools", was organised by the National Disaster Management Organisation (NADMO) with support from the UNICEF, World Health Organisation (WHO) and the Ghana Health Service (GHS).
Dr Amankwah said in spite of the fact that the Ministry of Health had made adequate preparations to handle additional cases, should they occur, it was important for Ghanaians to follow all the necessary guidelines made available by health personnel to protect themselves against any infection.
Dr Amankwah announced that in addition to the needed logistics made available to the Noguchi Memorial Institute into Medical Research (NMIMR) to effectively test samples from any hospital in the country, the GHS had about 400,000 capsules of the recommended drug for the treatment of the disease.
The Director of Public Health said unlike other known pandemics which usually affected children under five and adults above 65 globally, the new influenza seemed to affect persons between 15 and 45 who belonged to the productive age.
A representative of the Ministry of Education, Mr Victor Kofi Mantey acknowledged the role of schools in the prevention of an outbreak of the pandemic in Ghana, and explained that teachers were being e trained on the emergency preparedness plan for educational institutions.
Mr Mantey, who is the Director of Teacher Education, appealed to heads of schools to plan and ensure that the teaching and learning process continued even if some teachers or pupils were infected and had to stay at home.
He went ahead to talk about the signs and symptoms of the influenza and also how people could protect themselves from being infected.
He mentioned hand washing and respiratory etiquette as well as early treatment as some of the measures one could take to stay safe from the virus.
The National Coordinator of the National Disaster Management Organisation (NADMO), Mr Kofi Portuphy, said the organisation would continue to help in the education of the public but not wait till the situation got out of hand.
The chairperson for the function, Mrs Ellen Mensah who is also an educationalist, said there were more than six million schoolchildren in both the public and private basic schools, including the kindergarten who had to be protected from the pandemic.
She appealed to the participants to take the training programme seriously to enable them identify the symptoms of the disease, should any pupil suffer from it to ensure early treatment.