Accra, Dec. 01, GNA – Sickle Gene Action Foundation (SGAF), a Sickle Cell Disease (SCD) advocacy group, has been launched in Accra, with a call on society for a collective action in the fight against SCD in Ghana.
The aim of the Group is to make SCD medications like Hydroxyurea and treatment guidelines widely accessible throughout the country.
The Organisation would also collaborate with the government and other stakeholders to find solutions to the challenges hindering the treatment and management of SCD in the country.
Madam Victoria Awo Twumasi, Executive Director, SGAF, said: “The Organisation believes that early diagnoses, early access to affordable treatment and early public health awareness with quality sickle cell centres for prompt management of the condition is critical to saving lives.”
According to Madam Twumasi, measures such as stakeholder engagements, and public health interventions like counselling were needed to help find solutions to the challenges in the treatment and management of SCD.
She, therefore, called on all stakeholders to join in the fight against SCD by driving national awareness and strengthening the role of civil society in advocacy.
Dr Yvonne Brew, Pediatrician, Child Health Department, Greater Accra Regional Hospital (GARH), said that “there is the need for newborns to be screened for SCD so that treatment can start early to save their lives”.
“Early detection saves lives. We must know that if a child survives, society also survives,” she said.
She asked that the government and stakeholders made screening and hydroxyurea (medication for severe SCD) for newborn babies accessible in all facilities to save more lives.
She also urged families, friends and society to show love to persons living with SCD because it contributed to treatment.
Madam Mary Lamptey, National Nurse Coordinator for Newborn Screening, who also spoke about newborn screening for SCD, said the process was quite simple and encouraged parents to allow their children to be screened.
She spoke about how the initiative was started by the late Prof Ohene Frimpong in the Ashanti region in 1992 but had to be halted due to lack of funding.
GNA