The Ministry of Health (MoH) says it has secured GH¢11 million apart from the initial seed money of GH¢2.8 million allocated towards the preparedness and response to any potential outbreak of the Coronavirus (COVID-19) in Ghana.

Mr Kwaku Agyeman-Manu, the Minister of Health who made this known said the funds would be used to undertake essential activities like monitoring of suspected cases, improve surveillance, investigate cases, operate treatment centres and laboratories.

Speaking at a News conference in Accra on Wednesday, he said, his ministry was making efforts to mobilise enough money to address the funding gap as the country needed GH¢35 million to implement its preparedness plan effectively.

He said as at March 4, a total of 40 suspected coronavirus cases were reported and tested in the country.

About seven of the suspected cases were picked from the Kotoka International Airport and the remaining were recorded from people who voluntarily walked into the health facilities to get checked.

“All 40 suspected cases investigated by the Noguchi Memorial Institute for Medical Research (NMIMR) and Kumasi Centre for Collaborative Research (KCCR) have tested negative for COVID-19,” he said.

Mr Agyemang Manu said, procurement of more reagents and primers for confirmation of coronavirus cases was on-going and urged the public to wash their hands regularly with soap under running water, use hand sanitizers, where necessary and avoid hand shaking as much as possible

He advised people to keep a distance of at least one metre from a persons showing signs of fever, cough and difficulty in breathing and also seek treatment immediately at the nearest health facility if infection was suspected.

According to the World Health Organisation, (WHO), Coronavirus was a family of viruses that caused illness ranging from the common cold to more severe diseases such as Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) and the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MARS)

According to worldometer, a website hosted by the American Library Association, as at 1819hours on March 4 2020, about 95,079 coronavirus cases with 3,249 deaths were recorded worldwide and 51,432 persons recovered from the virus infections.

Symptoms of Coronavirus include; fever, cough, and difficulty in breathing which could be fatal.

The disease is spread through coughing and sneezing; close personal unprotected risk by touching or contact with infected person).

Presently, various treatment options are being explored, there is no cure, treatment is mainly symptomatic, there is no vaccine and prevention is mainly by adherence to cough and sneezing etiquette and improved personal hygiene.