WAG HEALTY START CAMPAIGN

                                                                   

Water Aid Ghana has launched its Healthy Start Advocacy Campaign. The four–year advocacy campaign seek to mobilize action to end child deaths, create concern about the health of the nation and find solutions to the problem. Explaining the campaign to the media, the Country Director at Water Aid Ghana, Dr. Afia Zakiya  said  the advocacy will focus on improving the health and nutrition of newborns and children under age five.

Water Aid Ghana is an International Non-Governmental Organization for the past years have been collaborating with other civic society organizations in Ghana and stakeholders to transforms lives by improving access to safe water, hygiene and sanitation in the world’s poorest communities. The Country Director of Water Aid Ghana, Dr. Afia Zakiya said its main aim under the healthy start advocacy campaign is to contribute to the reduction of the newborn and child morbidity in Ghana.  She noted that access to clean water and safe sanitation are the basic right of every citizen, adding that  when these right are combined with good hygiene practices they constitute the essential building blocks for good health. Dr. Zakiya point out that poor hygiene practices, poor sanitation and unclean water have a negative impact on the health of individual particularly newborn and children. She started that according to  the Committing on Child  Survival Progress Report for 2014, globally five hundred thousand children under age five  die from diarrhea every year. She said fifty percent of these deaths are caused by infections related to poor environmental conditions. She said  these deaths can be reduce drastically if much attention is given  to the public health system.   Dr. Zakiya noted that in order to achieve this,

there is the need to give all children a health start by working with commitment and dedication for the transformation of the public health system.  The Head of Policy and Partnership at Water Aid Ghana, Musa Ibrahim noted that the time has come for Ghana to promote the global action plan for pneumonia and diarrhea as well as scaling up the nutrition plan. He said the Country needs to focus more on newborn health to urgently increase the newborn survival. The WASH and Health Focal Lead at the Water Aid Ghana Dr. Chaka Uzondu said that diarrhea is the third biggest killer of children under age five, and such there is the need to intensify the promotion on hygiene in the Country.  yvonnenyaku@wateraid.org