Navrongo (U/E), Jan 19, GNA - Mrs. Lucy Awuni, the Deputy Upper East Regional Minister, has said Ghana's chances of attaining the Millennium Development goals on health would depend on instilling in health professionals skills and knowledge to enhance health delivery. Mrs Awuni said this when she launched a three-week intensive training programme in Navrongo for 150 Health Extension Workers under the National Youth Employment Programme (NYEP).

She said the government had not only implemented the programme to equi= p the youth with skills but had also designed it to allow the youth who were unable to continue their education to higher levels to do so with the allowances they earned whilst on the programme. Mrs Awuni appealed to the trainees to be committed and have passion fo= r the work.

She said cases of HIV and AIDS, prostitution, armed robbery cases and indiscipline among the youth were on the increase and appealed to religious authorities to help in the crusade against these vices. Mr. Emmanuel Andema, the District Chief Executive for Kassena-Nankana East, said apart from the health model underway, the NYEP had implemented i= n the district the Trade and Vocation, Community Teaching Assistants, Community Protection Unit, Internship and Waste and Sanitation models. Madam Margaret Bawah, District Director of Health Services, said the training for HEW to function as support staff in the health sector would cover six months where trainees would be taken through theory, field exercises and examination.

She said trainees were expected to learn health sector organization an= d structure, ethics and patients rights, communication and inter personal relations, basic structure of the human body and function, environmental sanitation and safety. Mr. Abdul-Mumin Abdul Karim, District NYEP coordinator, called on trainees not to see themselves as substantive nurses within the short spate of time but to see the programme as preparing them to be effective health assistants during their engagement.