Kumasi, Aug. 24, GNA - Dr Kofi Asare, Ashanti Regional Director of Health Services, on Wednesday said low budgetary allocation to the Directorate to undertake health care activities this year, was affecting efforts to develop health status in the region to an appreciable standard.

He said out of an estimated 167.8 billion cedis to the Directorate only 52 billion cedis had so far been released and this had made it difficult to carry out outreach programmes to bring down Out-Patient-Department (OPD) attendances.

Dr Asare announced this when addressing the closing session of a two-day annual half-year performance review meeting of the Ashanti Regional Directorate of Health in Kumasi.

He expressed concern about the lack of adequate health equipment at most district hospitals in the region, that had resulted in most emergency cases being referred to the Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital (KATH) in Kumasi for treatment.

The Ashanti Regional Director, therefore appealed to the Ministry of Health to help equip the district hospitals with the necessary modern facilities to ease the pressure on KATH.

He appealed to health workers to use dialogue to demand better conditions of service instead of resorting to strikes. This, he said, would help in the promotion of an effective health care delivery and save precious lives that could be lost during an industrial action by health workers in the country.