The Upper East Regional Directorate has called on the media to help sensitise the public to how best to prevent cholera and Ebola in their respective communities.
At an encounter with the media in the region, the Deputy Director of Public Health, Dr Joseph Opare, noted that residents of the region took concoctions to manage cholera, sometimes with disastrous consequences.
He said in 2014 the region recorded a total of 287 cholera cases with nine deaths in 11 out of the 13 districts.
He intimated that various stakeholders in the region collaborated to contain the situation.
The containment efforts, he said, included distributing some cholera management logistics, house-to-house community education, outbreak investigations and the development of an action plan for case management.
The director stressed the need for landlords to provide toilet facilities in their homes while patients should seek early medical treatment since cholera treatment was free.
Ebola
Touching on Ebola, Dr Opare said 10 suspected cases of Ebola were recorded in the Bawku West, Bawku and Bolgatanga municipalities and Kassena Nankana West district.
He said the results of the 10 suspected cases all proved negative; however, eight of them died from other health concerns.
According to him, a total of 6,658 travellers, mostly from Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger, were screened at all points of entry across the region for Ebola.
He observed that the region had a lot of unapproved entry points and routes which required that stakeholders in the health sector, including the public, must be more vigilant to prevent the spread of Ebola.
He further stated that the health authorities in the region were making efforts to start educating the public through the use of information vans so that people could actually appreciate the need to take precautionary measures in health matters.
