Wa, Jan. 13, GNA - Child Support Ghana, a non-governmental organization (NGO), operating in the Upper West Region, has within the past three years supported 80 women who were diagnosed HIV positive, at its hospice at Danku in the Wa Municipality. Twenty of them died at the facility while the remaining 60 had their conditions improved through the administration of retroviral drugs and were discharged to rejoin their families.

Reverend Dan Seidu, Executive Director of Child Support Ghana, made these known at the inauguration of a vocational training centre for street girls, established by the NGO at Kpaguri, a suburb of Wa. He expressed worry that the women who were discharged might not be practicing safe sex even though they received counselling at the facility as one of them was discovered to be pregnant.

Rev. Seidu said the establishment of the centre would help train and guide poor, vulnerable and desolate young girls to acquire skills, after which they would be provided with tools to enable them to undertake profitable ventures to keep them away from the streets. Mr. David Yakubu, Regional Coordinating Director, who opened the centre, said despite the fact that such facilities existed for the development of children in the Northern, Upper East and West Regions, some of them were not affordable to the average person. He said good quality education and health were critical for the early development of children. Child Support Ghana works in association with Child Support Netherlands, an international NGO.