“Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty”- John Philpot Curran. While the ground zero for the coronavirus outbreak, China, is currently stabilized and with very few counts of people with the virus, Ghana, on the other hand, has had an uprise in its counts in the past week, collating about 24 infected while tracing over 300 people suspected to have come in contact with these victims.
Though the government is doing everything in its power to curb the situation, it seems his efforts are not enough for the outright prevention of the spread of the virus. Currently, the government of Ghana has closed all the borders of the country as they continue to quarantine travelers for 14days upon their arrival into the country before set free into the system. There has also been a fumigation exercise in all major markets in Accra as there has been a rigorous education on social distancing, personal hygiene, self-quarantine and reporting one’s self when they suspect or show signs of being affected by the virus. But are these enough?
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Artists like Shatta Wale have appealed to the government to adopt a more proactive approach to the situation instead of reactive; they believe instead of waiting for people to report their symptoms at which time it may have been too late or may have infected numerous people, the government should rather employ more nurses who are currently unemployed at home to hit the street, do random testing of citizens especially places with outbreaks like Accra. Door to door testing so as to detect the virus early for treatment especially for those asymptomatic patients which will obviously reduce the spread of the virus and end it completely in Ghana.
Also with the fumigation of markets, what exactly is being sprayed? And what could be done to ensure that the markets are not contaminated one again by the people who make the dirt and carry the virus? Is there a way to punish people caught dirtying the market or a way to make sure infected people who are currently unaware and at home don’t go back to the markets to spread the virus.
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In order to prevent the spread of the virus to unaffected regions, stringent measures in between regions should be discouraged unless it’s absolutely necessary and there could be checkpoints to check those going in and out of a region.
Lastly, the roads and transportation ministry need to sit up in order to ensure that commercial vehicle drivers abide by the rules of the president by ensuring the necessary sanitation and social distancing in vehicles on the roads.
