In a recent Question and Answer session, AfriKids Ghana Director of Programmes, David Pwalua spoke about what our COVID-19 response team has been up to and what the future could look like for AfriKids’ programmes. Here’s what he had to say:
“The local people that AfriKids works with have compared the impact ofCOVID-19 to the famine that hit Ghana in the early 80’s, which was as a result of prolonged drought and bush fires.
The COVID-19 case count in Ghana today stands at a little over 45,000 cases and almost 300 deaths. Although this information might look impressive, it is not representative of the reality on the ground. There has been a complete shortage of PPE, no appropriate public health COVID-19 messagingand lack of testing andproper tracing.
The economic situation has worsened, lots of job losses, businesses collapsing due to COVID-19 restrictions and prolonged school closure. This is worsening the plight of vulnerable persons. Prolonged stay of children at home has increased their levels of malnourishment and anxiety, reduced educational outcomes and increased the chances of children suffering from all sorts of abuses.”
So here’s how AfriKids has responded:
“First, we set up an AfriKids COVID-19 response team. The team provided communities with public health education, on the cases and effects of COVID-19, proper handwashing and child protection. We provided marginalised families with some PPE, food packs, soap and hand sanitizers to over 1 million individuals from 300 households. We have also trained parents to provide Cerebral Palsytherapyfor their children at home due to limited number of CP clinics. Further, our family livelihood programme revised its mode of operations – reducing interest rates, providing training in business skills for women.”
With your help, we have made huge strides already but we have a long way to go.
“If AfriKids is able to continue with its ground-breaking interventions, which I trust we will do courtesy of your kind support,youcan be assured that, the very marginalised persons from northern Ghana will be able to build resilience against the impact of COVID-19.”
Click below to make an urgent donation to our Crisis Appealto help our COVID-19 response team continue this work.
