Training of male midwives begins
The Ministry of Health, in collaboration with the Ghana Health Services, has begun training males as midwives in selected midwifery training schools in the country this academic year.
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The first batch of males started the training at Pantang, Goaso and Asante-Mampong, this academic year. They would be awarded diplomas in midwifery after training.
Addressing the matriculation ceremony of the Garden City University College (GCUC), the Offinso Municipal Director of Health Services, Mrs Beatrice Appah, said the training of males to offer services to women in labour would address the posting of personnel to rural communities.
Explaining, she said many female midwives often refused postings to rural communities after their training, a situation that greatly undermined the quest to reduce maternal mortality in the country.
“With the training of males as midwives, the incident of high maternal mortality in the country will be greatly reduced because most female midwives have refused to accept posting to rural communities, leading to high incidence of maternal mortality cases. The training of males as midwives will also fill the yawning gap that has been left behind, following the retirement of many midwives in the country,” she added.
Mrs Appah said interested male community health nurses had already been enrolled into some selected Midwifery Training Schools to run a pilot scheme, after which it would be replicated in other institution across the country.
A total of 856 students — 409 males and 447 females — were admitted to pursue diploma and degree programmes in Nursing, Midwifery, Physician Assistantship, Medical Laboratory Technicians, ICT and Business at the GCUC.
In her address, the President of the University, Dr Wilhelmina Donkoh, said the school had introduced the Summer School system, where students are admitted to run different academic schedules while the normal academic programmes also runs.
For a start, students will be admitted to the business and ICT programmes of the Summer School and their academic calendar will commence in January next year.
This, according to Dr Donkoh, will also help absorb a backlog of senior secondary school graduates who could not get admission to the mainstream university admissions in September.
She called on the government to support the private universities by way of tax reliefs, subventions and teaching and learning equipment to ease their burden.
Dr Donkoh appealed to the government to, as a matter of urgency, improve the road from the Airport Roundabout to Kenyase, which is in a deplorable state.
