practices

Akosoa Village (C/R), Oct. 23, GNA - A Senior Nursing Officer of the Winneba Government Hospital, Mrs. Kumassah, has urged fishermen who migrate from community to community and region to region to pursue fishing work to be extra mindful in their sexual activities. Mrs. Kumassah was addressing chiefs and people of Akosoa Village, a fishing community near Winneba, on the devastating effects of the HIV/AIDS on families and the nation as a whole at a public forum organised by the Awutu-Effutu-Senya District Assembly to educate fishermen and their families on the dangers posed by the pandemic. Mrs. Kumassah told the people that HIV/AIDS is real and is killing a lot of Ghanaians and warned them to help reduce the spread of the disease by changing their sexual behaviours wherever they might find themselves.

Mr. Charles Ashalley Djane, District Deputy Co-ordinating Director and HIV/AIDS Focal Person for Awutu-Effutu-Senya District, disclosed that between the year 2000 and 2003, the disease had affected 169 people, made up of 101 females and 68 males as at the end of last year. Mr. Ashalley Djane gave the breakdown of the figures as follows, 2000 eight females and 2 males, 2001 eleven females and 5 males, 2002 twenty-eight females and 22 males, and 2003 fifty-four females and 39 males.

He said the district assembly and the central government were doing all within their capabilities to curb the spread of the disease, adding that it is regrettable that most Ghanaians who are in their reproductive stage have conceived wrong perception towards the existence of the disease.

Mr. Ashalley Djane cautioned people in the area to do away with such believes and strive to denounce promiscuity and adopt methods which could protect them against contracting the pandemic. Mr. Mawule Kofi and other resource persons later educated the people on how to handle accident victims and other issues which could lead them into contracting the disease.

A five-member sensitisation committee made on the chairmanship of Mr. Kofi Ahiadzor was form at the meeting. 23 Oct. 04