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Fraud in the era of Covid-19 — DSP Tenge
These people could be fraudsters who want to take advantage of the COVID-19 contact tracing procedure to harm, abuse or extort money from children.
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Speaking to the Junior Graphic on safety measures children should take while at home, the Accra Regional Police Public Relations Officer, DSP Effia Tenge, said some people were going round homes with medical apparatus under the pretext of testing whether households had Covid-19 or not.
She said if there was the need for contact tracing, parents would be made aware before the health personnel paid a visit to homes and advised that before they opened their doors to strangers, they should get their parents’ or guardian’s consent first.
On child abuse, DSP Tenge said children should not be afraid to report anybody who touched any part of their body to their parents or guardians because they would not die if they did so.
“Don’t take it for granted that people are not there to harm you, a lot of people are at home doing nothing, so be security conscious”, she added.
She noted that there was a lot of information online about Covid-19 but not all of it was true so before they believed something they read on the Internet, they should verify from their parents.
“Never drink any concoction or use a product with the aim of preventing the coronavirus. If you feel any discomfort, don’t assume that you have the disease and take matters into your own hands, let an adult know for immediate medical attention”, she pointed out.
On cyber security, DSP Tenge said children would be online, doing their assignments and research now more than ever but there were also bad people waiting for them and advised that they should not accept any friend requests from people they did not know.
“Whatever the pressure is, never send nude photos of yourself or post your home address online and report anybody who asks you to do that to an adult.
She cautioned children against abusing the police emergency numbers to ask for ice creams and biscuits because their numbers would be blocked if they did so, adding that, when that happened they would be unable to call the police in real emergencies.
“Call 191 and 18555 for the police in real emergencies. For health, call 311 or 112. These are hotlines so please don’t abuse them”, she added.
“Meanwhile obey all protocols by not touching surfaces of items; washing of hands with soap under running water regularly and sneezing into a tissue and disposing of it immediately’’.
