Bolgatanga, Nov. 19, GNA - Non-governmental organizations have appealed to the Ghana Health Service (GHS) and the Ministry of Health (MOH) to make measles and polio vaccination exercise a sub regional programme. They said the exercise could be carried out with Burkina Faso, Togo and Cote d'Ivoire to avoid the transmission of the diseases back to Ghana. The Ghana Coalition of NGOs in Health said this when it commended the Upper East Regional Health Directorate for its successful implementation of the recent measles immunization exercise at a press conference on Friday. The Regional Vice Chairman of the Ghana Coalition of NGOs in Health, Mr Noble Asakeya Alagsikomah, said measles could be eradicated if the GHS and MOH liaised with their counterparts in neighbouring countries to carry out measles and polio vaccination simultaneously.

He expressed happiness about the way the Regional Health Directorate went about the recent national measles campaign and vaccination exercise. Mr Alagsikomah said when the coalition conducted an independent monitoring exercise into the immunization exercise in the region it was discovered that vaccination took place at all places, including, entertainment spots, market centres, churches, mosques, funeral grounds and lorry parks.

He said at the regional level all officers were in the field to ensure the success of the programme. "Collaboration with local partners and the community level was very effective. This made the Regional Health Directorate to achieve its immunization of measles target of 83 per cent".

Mr Alagsikomah said despite the inadequate health personnel in the Region, the Regional Directorate had stepped up its efforts in the area of providing free maternal health care, anti-retroviral treatment, anti stigma campaign and community health planning services. He said with the introduction of the National Health Insurance, access to health delivery in the Region had increased thereby putting pressure on the few health personnel in the Region. The Coalition appealed to donor communities especially World Health Organization and UNICEF to increase their support against all communicable vaccine preventable diseases especially infant related ones. The Coalition also appealed to GHS and MOH to put stringent measures in place to ensure that all doctors posted to the Region turn up and to also provide more health logistics to health facilities.