In commemoration of this year’s World Malaria Day on Monday, April 25, 2022, under the global theme ‘harness innovation to reduce the malaria disease burden and save lives’, the Alliance for Reproductive Health Rights on Tuesday, April 26, 2022, held a virtual forum with some Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) and partners to highlight their innovations toward reducing malaria in Ghana.
The forum provided participants with the opportunity to share key lessons, best practices, and other interventions related to malaria prevention, control, and management from their work over the years. This was oriented toward efforts to scale up and improve malaria outcomes in Ghana and consequently, the delivery of quality health care services, particularly to vulnerable groups, and to further improve the work that CSOs continue to do in general.
ARHR on the occasion of this forum highlighted approaches adopted in its fight against malaria through the “Bridging Gaps; Innovate for Malaria” Project which it undertook with funding from Comic Relief.
Speaking at the forum, the Executive Director of ARHR, Madam Vicky Okine, who chaired the meeting, stated that the “Bridging Gaps; Innovate for Malaria” Project aimed to bring about changes in access to quality health care and better outcomes in malaria control, particularly among pregnant women, and children under five in high risk and malaria-endemic areas in Ghana. She further lauded CSOs in Ghana for their efforts toward improving not just malaria outcomes but quality health outcomes in Ghana.
The Executive Director for African Media and Malaria Research Network (AMMREN), Dr. Charity Binka, in her presentation emphasized the need for a strengthened CSOs-media partnership. She noted that her organization has been working in partnership with the media in its fight against malaria by directly engaging them in communities, which has allowed for effective and impactful news reporting on malaria. This, she indicated has included the real account of survivors of malaria and those who have suffered losses of malaria. She thus urged CSOs present to devise new strategies to keep the interest of the media in the fight against malaria.
“The media play a key role in the fight against malaria; hence we must adopt innovative ways of sustaining their interests in the fight against malaria,” Dr. Binka said
The Chief Executive Officer for SEND Ghana, Mr. Siapha Kamara in his submission on malaria activities undertaken by his organizations revealed that SEND Ghana engages in the fight against malaria by leading the People for Health (P4H) initiative, which is being implemented by a consortium including Ghana News Agency and Penplusbytes, to help reduce inequity in the delivery of health in Ghana through the promotion of good governance practices in the planning and monitoring, and evaluation systems at district and national levels.
The Anglican Diocesan Development and Relief Organization (ADDRO) identifies gaps in malaria prevention, control and management and addresses these gaps by rolling out a ‘hang out’ campaign; including the local chemical sellers in malaria prevention, control, and management; training of Ghana Health Service staff in the rural communities; supporting health facilities with medicines and rapid diagnostic test kits and using opinion or community leaders as malaria champions.
ARHR on the occasion of this forum officially launched a Photobook and broadcasted a documentary on its B4M malaria project. Over 30 Civil Society Organizations, Community-Based Organizations and partners participated in the meeting. The key outcomes of the meeting will be documented and shared with these partners and other relevant key stakeholders.
