The Ghana Health Service (GHS) on Wednesday (22 June 2022) dismissed reports making the rounds that the country has recorded its first case of Ebola.
A handful of mainstream media reports said that a case of Ebola in the Northern Region had been confirmed as positive. Further investigation showed that the reports had emerged from a misreading of a health simulation exercise.
Briefing the media in Accra, the director general of the Health Service, Patrick Kuma-Aboagye, said: “I want to use this opportunity to say there is no Ebola case in Ghana.”
Dr Kuma-Aboagye confirmed that what had happened in Tamale was a simulation exercise which was misreported by the media.
Health officials on the lookout
The Northern regional disease surveillance officer, Francis Atiagbor, corroborated what the director general later said.
“I am not aware that we have picked an Ebola case in the Northern Region, but what I can say for a fact is that we were doing a simulation exercise on the Ebola virus disease at the Public Health Emergency Management Operation Centre,” he told Baba Kamil, Asaase’s Northern regional correspondent.
“Simulation exercises are part of one of the requirements under international health regulations. All countries are enjoined to do simulation exercises regularly to test their preparedness for such public health emergencies.”
Listen to Francis Atiagbor in the audio clip attached below:
The Ebola virus disease (EVD) is a rare and deadly disease in human beings and non-human primates.
The viruses that cause EVD are found mainly in sub-Saharan Africa. People can catch EVD through direct contact with an infected animal (a bat or non-human primate) or by coming into contact with a sick or dead person infected with the Ebola virus.
Fred Dzakpata
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