The Director of Health Promotions at the Ghana Health Service, Dr. DaCosta Aboagye, has advised Ghanaians to welcome, wholeheartedly, persons released from mandatory quarantine by the State and also, not to stigmatize COVID-19 patients.

Speaking to an Accra-based radio station, 3 fm, on Tuesday, April 7, 2020, Dr. DaCosta, who doubles as the Chairman of the Risk Communications and Social Mobilization Committee for COVID-19, said, such conduct will make nonsense of Ghana’s efforts at fighting the global pandemic.

“The government of President Akufo-Addo is, thus far, making significant strides in the fight against this deadly disease following the support and cooperation the government is receiving from the Ghanaians people.

However, reports in the media suggesting that some of the people who have recently been released from mandatory quarantine as well as persons diagnosed with COVID-19 are being stigmatized, are worrying and counterproductive…

If this trend is not arrested immediately, it has the tendency of retarding the gains that the nation has made thus far. For fear of being stigmatized, persons who may be experiencing covert symptoms of the disease, will not be willing to report to the hospital for testing, and would, in the process, end up spreading the virus, albeit unintentionally”, Dr. DaCosta noted.

He also expressed fears that, even though the mortality rate for COVID-19 is low in Ghana and elsewhere, the rising incidence of stigmatization of people who have been diagnosed of the disease may end up killing them thereby increasing the mortality rate.

“The disease might not kill the people who have been diagnosed positive, but the stigma will”, he observed.

To this end, the Chairman of the Risk Communications and Social Mobilization Committee for COVID-19, Dr. DaCosta implored Ghanaians to welcome persons who have been released from quarantine because they do not pose any health threat to society.

Similarly, he advised Ghanaians not to stigmatize COVID-19 patients in order to help the country stave off this pandemic for the love of God and humanity.