Ignorance, they say, is darker than night. Must we not refuse to let partisan politics be our cozy blankets and sleeping beds in that darkness, and rather strive to be brighter than light?
Maybe, and just maybe, we must remind ourselves and resolve in unison not to purchase ignorance at an expensive price or pursue it at the peril of our lives when wisdom is readily available at our fingertips and free of charge.
The recently launched Ghana Medical Trust Fund by the President of Ghana, H.E. John Dramani Mahama must be embraced and saved at all costs, for as Ralph Waldo Emerson in 1860 wrote “The first wealth is health”. This statement is said to highlight the importance of health as a building block for prosperous life, community and economy.
Indeed, it has never been out of place for many thinkers, leaders and ordinary people, past and present to believe in, and inject in their speeches, sermons and writings the assertion that a healthy nation is a wealthy nation.
One of the disheartening, painful, sad and helpless situations one can unexpectedly be in, is to see a loved one, be it a family member, friend, a countryman or your fellow human struggling with chronic ailment and you have no means to help. The individual struggles knowing there is no hope and slowly gives up, departing the surface of the earth to see him or her no more.
More disheartening is when in the cause of the struggles, the privacy of the sick and health information is flouted, especially on print and electronic media, including social media these days, all in the name of soliciting funds for treatment.
In some instances, the funds are ultimately raised after the condition has worsened, additional cost accumulated, and by the time it is realized, the sick person has already kicked the bucket and been buried.
In Ghana today, partisan politics has succeeded in eroding some aspects, if not all our lives, especially our decision making and love for each other as a people with a common destiny. The academia, public services, security services, entrepreneurs, the clergy and students have all not been able to insulate themselves from that perception.
Partisan politics has succeeded in crawling into homes, schools, markets, workplaces and palaces to sever relationships and destroy homes. It has also ignited and fueled some tribal wars and chieftaincy disputes.
One unforgivable mistake Ghanaians will make is to politicize the recently launched Ghana Medical Trust Fund (GMTF) also referred to as Mahama Cares. The politicians to make that mistake to robe in the partisan canker Ghana has been bedevil with for years, to discredit this brilliant intervention will forever be in the history books for generations to read their diabolic stance against efforts to provide such comprehensive healthcare support to the people of Ghana.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), out of the 33,787,914 population of Ghana recorded in 2023, the age distribution of the population in percentage shows that 77% are between ages 15 to 64 years. 4.7% are 65 years and over. The rest forms 18% accounting for the 0 to 14 years age group.
WHO reports that life expectancy at birth (years) is 66.1 years in 2021, compared to 63.6 years in the whole of Africa. Stroke is reported to be the highest leading cause of death. It is followed by Tuberculosis, Lower Respiratory infections, Ischemic heart disease, Malaria, HIV/AIDS, Road injury, Preterm birth complications and kidney disease, in that order.
Healthcare delivery cost in Ghana is increasingly becoming expensive, and access to care facilities is springing up in the cities with most of them closer to the residents, majority remain private owned.
Residents must travel distances to access public polyclinics and health centers when they need health services. This becomes more challenging in emergency situations. There are no reliable ambulance services to convey patients, especially the elderly, to the nearest Hospitals while First Aid is being administered.
In some instances, the Hospitals do not have empty beds for the sick person upon arrival of the ambulance. The cumulative effects of not visiting health care centers for annual or periodic medical examinations are the reasons for some of the emergency situations.
This is evident among the elderly, especially those above 45 years. This group are mainly unemployed and have no direct dependable source of income, making it difficult for them to even transport themselves to healthcare facilities for some basic preventive health care services, let alone paying for those services.
Many of them resort to staying at home without knowing their health status and confine themselves to self-medication until emergency strikes. Others resort to herbal medications not certified by the Food and Drug Authority (FDA) and other unorthodox means of treatments, eventually complicating their woes leading to damage of important organs like, the brain, lungs, kidneys and heart.
Many among the group that are more vulnerable live with high blood pressure, diabetes, mild stroke, and vision problems, just to mention a few.
My interaction with some of that age group brought to light some instances where prescriptions are written upon Hospital visits only to be ignored for lack of funds to purchase the medications.
Over the years, attempts have been made to revamp the health delivery system in Ghana to increase accessibility of healthcare. From the cash-and-carry period where a patient must make payment in advance before care or treatment is provided, to the introduction of the full National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) which was to ensure patients receive treatment first before payment.
The NHIS became law in 2003 with the Ghana National Health Insurance Authority charged with the monitoring and regulating the operation of the health insurance schemes. It was to be Ghana’s vehicle in attainment of the WHO Universal Health Coverage.
The goal was to provide comprehensive healthcare services to the citizenry with the greater part of its funding coming from the National Health Insurance Levy slapped on many items as a tax. The scheme will begin crumbling and not meeting the comprehensive nature envisaged. It ended up covering only some regular visits to healthcare facilities only and departed from covering chronic and life-threatening health conditions.
The National Health Insurance Scheme is currently not acceptable to most private health facilities. In fact, even in the public healthcare facilities, many health conditions and prescriptions are not covered by the NHIS.
President John Dramani Mahama during the launching of the Ghana Medical Trust Fund, stated that the fund is expected to support the treatment for various chronic conditions, including cancers, diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, kidney failure, and stroke.
He further stated that “The Ghana Medical Trust Fund will operate as an independent statutory trust, governed by a board of trustees, and supported by a dedicated administrative secretariat, third-party administrators, and patient navigators”.
With proper management of the GMTF coupled with an intensive fund raising devoid of any partisan spectacle, a massive educational campaign to drum in the essence of the Trust Fund and increasing awareness of preventive care, especially personal hygiene and anti-pollution initiatives, the ‘Mahama Cares’ stands to revolutionize healthcare accessibility and delivery in Ghana.
Managers of the Trust fund must not limit their fundraising exploits to the four corners of Ghana only. They must as a matter of urgency spread their fundraising tentacles outside Ghana to include Ghanaians living abroad, global money remittance companies, nonprofit organizations, Banks, local and foreign business, including local retail shops in raising funds. For the beneficiaries of the funds, if not already their customers and clients, are potential customers and clients.
Partnership with companies who are vehicles for money remittance into Ghana could offer a voluntary donation platform for their customers sending money to their loved ones and families in Ghana to elect to donate towards the Ghana Medical Trust Fund. For one United States or Canadian dollar, one Euro, one British pound, and one any currency donated by a million people can give the GMTS a million of any of those currencies to go a long way in saving lives.
Partnerships with local Banks to within the confines of the law, prompt customers to voluntarily elect to donate at least one Cedi as donations towards the GMTF at the Automated Teller Machines (ATMs), for a million one Cedi donated, is one million Ghana Cedis to go a long way in saving children with cancers, heart and kidney diseases and other chronic diseases.
Donation boxes placed at various local retail shops with bold inscription of GMTF under the strict supervision of the shop owners will bring the fundraising to the doorsteps of many to equally donate towards saving their own lives and that of others when they fall sick.
Government must create favorable business environments for large scale manufacturing companies and service providing companies to consider and factor into their budgets, as part of their many corporate social responsibilities to donate to the Ghana Medical Trust Fund.
As the Director General of WHO said in the speech delivered in Nigeria in April 2018 at UHC Roundtable-World Health Organization (WHO), published on April 12, 2018, on WHO website, https://www.who.int/director-general/speeches/detail/uhc-roundtable,
“No one should have to choose between buying medicine and buying food for their family” and continued to say,
“No one should have to choose between death and poverty. It’s not only important for the individual, it’s important for the nation”.
Indeed, a healthy nation is a wealthy nation, and every life matters.
Ghana has suffered a lot in the hands of those who read partisan politics in everything and seem not to care about the danger their continuous selfish stance has caused a dear nation Ghana.
Only if they will spare a moment to reflect for a second and make amends in repentance for the sake of a dear nation Ghana and her generations unborn to come, they would have contributed to giving back to the people their once cherished good health, unity and happiness that partisan politics has stolen from them for decades.
However, if they refuse and choose to wallow in that ‘partisan disease’, and equally refuse to for once clean their partisan political lenses that sees no Ghana to save, develop or emancipate from the ‘crimes’ of partisan politics, then they must be told blatantly in the face without any aota of apology that the ‘partisan disease’ of theirs, is the only disease the GMTF cannot and will not cover.
Diseases that the GMTS will fully take care of are not partisan, and all must support the Ghana Medical Trust Fund (Mahama Cares) to Succeed.
For we must strive amid all odds to nurture our society to be one that believes in making healthcare accessibility for all a right, and not a privilege, irrespective of the political party one belongs to or does not belong to.
I rest my PEN.
Mustapha Alhassan
Pennsylvania, USA
