The headquarters of Ghana Water Company Limited (GWCL), has shut down for a week after the detection of some 19 cases of coronavirus, according to some workers there.
It comes as reports available to The Herald, says one of its former Water Managing Director, who left the employ of the state water provider years ago, Kweku Botwe, has also been killed by the coronavirus, further heightening the fear around the disease which has taken the lives of Nanabanyin Pratt, a younger brother of ace journalist Kwesi Pratt and the General Manager of Radio Gold, Sainti Baffoe-Bonnie.
The lockdown of the GWCL which started on Monday, followed a test conducted at the place on the instruction of management where out of the over 200 workers, the 19 individuals were detected as living with the condition.
Names of the workers were not given, but The Herald is informed that, the headquarters will open for business sometime next week.
In the case of Kweku Botwe, The Herald was informed that he died sometime about a week ago, at a health facility in Accra after being detected to have contracted the virus.
Family sources say, Mr Botwe, who was withdrawn from GWCL in 2013 by the Ministry of Works and Housing, had returned fro a business trip to Turkey, where he was believed to have acquired the condition.
Meanwhile, the Director-General of the Ghana Health Service (GHS), has revealed that twenty cases of the coronavirus, have been recorded in the schools since the reopening.
Dr Patrick Kuma-Aboagye, revealed this at a press conference in Accra yesterday.
“Greater Accra, has cumulatively reported about 20 cases in a couple of schools,” he said but failed to give out the names of the schools although this would help parents, teachers and students in these to take precautionary measures.
He added “Three cases, limited outbreaks have been recorded in two secondary schools from the Upper West. 34 contacts screen in the Upper West SHS school yielded one additional positive case. Thus, a school has three active cases and the second has one.”
It comes as the Mortuary Workers Association of Ghana (MOWAG) has questioned statistics on Covid-19 casualties the government has been reporting.
General Secretary of MOWAG, Richard Kofi Jordan, told host Aduanaba Kofi Asante Ennin that the government is massaging the actual figures for whatever reasons best known to them.
He explained that, “even the number of people who die in their various houses is more than the deaths”.
“We the mortuary attendants work closely with the doctors and we know the number of people who are brought into the morgue as a result of Covid-19, so we want to tell the public that the Covid-19 is real and so many people are dying contrary to what we have been told.”
He further admonished the public to adhere to the laid down Covid-19 protocols to fight the communal spread of the virus.
As at January 29, 2021, Ghana’s active Covid-19 cases stood at 5,358 with 67,010 confirmed cases and 416 deaths.
Thirty-six nurses at the Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital (KATH) in Kumasi, have within the last four weeks tested positive for Covid-19.
Averagely, each day since January 1, at least one nurse at the Hospital tests positive for the virus, a situation health experts, say has been the highest since the outbreak of the virus in March, 2020.
The Chairman for the Ghana Registered Nurses and Midwifery Association (GRNMA) for the KATH Gabriel Ofori Agyei, revealed he has recently tested positive for the virus, including his wife and kid.
Speaking on Akoma FM’s morning show Ghana Akoma, he explained the virus’ new wave has been very prevalent at the referral centre.
Mr Ofori Agyei told host Aduanaba Kofi Asante Ennin that “in the last 28 days, 36 of my staff have tested positive, including myself”.
“The virus has been very active in the past four weeks. Although there are PPEs available, most of the frontline workers are contracting the virus so I will appeal to the general public to adhere to the Covid-19 protocols to reduce the communal spread of the virus.”
Last year, between the months of March and December, 300 nurses at KATH tested positive for the virus, but it seems the second wave of the virus is spreading at a faster rate than before.
With the ongoing total disregard to safety protocols, more Ghanaians are feared to be infected especially among health workers.
Meanwhile, Information Minister-designate, Kojo Oppong Nkrumah, has been clarifying the decision of the President to ban funerals and weddings as part of measures to deal with the coronavirus.
In his 23rd update on the coronavirus virus last Sunday January 31, President Akufo-Addo, placed the ban on all social gatherings including weddings and funerals.
Providing further explanations into this matter, Mr Oppong Nkrumah said that “The president did not ban burial service because of the activity of burial, we actually encourage it to go on… What is banned is the funeral where typically in the Ghanaian community we will all gather, shake hands, announcement of people, then they’ll call for a song, people will come and dance, where there is a little party associated with it. That is what has been banned,”
He added “In the same way, when it comes to marriage, what the president has said is that, what in Ghana we call weddings, the full-blown wedding where we have a big party with reception and people dancing and people eating, sitting at reception tables, etc, that is what has been banned.
“We’ve got a lot of requests about what if somebody is having a church service, which is allowed, and they choose to bless their marriage there as part of the church service.
“I’m not sure that is what has been banned. It’s the wedding. The full-blown wedding with its reception and social activity associated with it is what has been banned”.
