Be more responsible for your health - President urges citizenry
The President, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, has called on the citizenry to take greater responsibility for their health in the face of risks posed by lifestyle diseases.
In an address to Parliament last Thursday that was devoted to gauging the health of the nation, the President threw the spotlight on the health of individuals and the rising number of people with weight and obesity challenges.
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He said: “The foods we eat, mode of cooking and the lack of exercise are all now having a great impression on our health. It is time we all learn to take responsibility for our health individually, and accept that our health is very much determined by our lifestyle.”
He observed that everybody was in danger of falling into the lifestyle disease trap, saying: “Too many of us are overweight and obesity is an increasing problem even among young people.”
The President said, however, that the nation had made progress in eradicating communicable diseases that used to be the main cause of mortality.
Non-communicable diseases (NCDs) are responsible for 43 per cent of all deaths in the country, leading the Ministry of Health to launch the Ghana Advocacy Agenda for People Living with NCDs on May 21, 2019.
The Advocacy Agenda serves to strengthen response to NCDs at national, regional and local levels in Ghana. It is a compass for civil society and people living with NCDs to demand action from decision makers, urge them to meet commitments and put the people first.
According to the Ghana Health Service (GHS), the major NCDs in Ghana were cardiovascular diseases, cancers, diabetes, chronic respiratory diseases and sickle cell disease.
NCDs in Ghana
The GHS lists conditions such as hypertension, stroke and diabetes as affecting both the young and old, urban and rural, and wealthy and poor communities.
It estimates that up to 48 per cent of Ghanaian adults have hypertension and nine per cent have diabetes.
The GHS says major causes of death have shifted from predominantly communicable diseases to a combination of communicable and chronic non-communicable diseases over the last few decades as hypertension, stroke, diabetes and cancers have become part of the top 10 causes of death in the country.
According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), the burden of the four common NCDs — cardiovascular diseases, cancers, diabetes and chronic respiratory diseases - were projected to increase due to ageing, rapid urbanisation and unhealthy lifestyles.
The WHO estimated the total number of deaths due to NCDs in Ghana in 2016 at 41,300 males and 53,100 females, making a total of 94,400 premature deaths.
Exercise more
In an interview with the Resident Medical Officer of the Graphic Communications Group Limited (GCGL), Dr Jacqui Barnes, she said the commonest risk factors of most NCDs were tobacco use, harmful use of alcohol, unhealthy diet and physical inactivity.
She said NCDs contributed significantly to illness, disability and deaths in the country.
In addition, she said urbanisation, changing lifestyle, including poor diets, ageing populations, globalisation and weak health systems were implicated in chronic disease risk, morbidity and mortality.
She called for new directions in research, practice and policy, saying they were needed urgently to solve the burden of NCDs on the citizenry.
Dr Barnes also called for the approaches to be supported with active partnerships among researchers, policy makers, industry, patient groups, civil society, government and development partners.
She reiterated the President’s call on people to take greater responsibility for their health and called on people to exercise more and eat healthy diets.