Malaria

Many of us are not very familiar with malaria and that is a good thing! However, in Ghana malaria is a very common disease. All four of us have malaria several times year. Malaria is an infectious disease caused by malaria parasites transmitted to humans by mosquitoes. In Ghana 3.5 million people contract malaria every year and of those approx 20,000 children under the age of five die. This makes malaria responsible for 25% of all infant deaths in Ghana. Over the years the Ghana Health Service in collaboration with the World Health Organisation, UNICEF and other organisations has done a lot of work to prevent and treat malaria. One of the things they do is to distribute insecticide treated nets to infants and pregnant women. They also distribute medication to community volunteers as a ‘home management of malaria’ strategy, so that people have prompt access to medication when necessary because in many communities there are no health facilities.

To stop the spread of malaria and to decrease its impact, there is also the need for people to change their behaviour and to be educated. For example, in the village where we live, mosquito nets have been distributed to families with young children and pregnant women. In the early years people were just given the nets to hang in their houses. However, that did not really work as many women and children often sleep on mats in the same hut but not in fixed places, so where were they supposed to hang the nets? Moreover, people have no hammers and nails in their houses to fix the nets properly, so many of the nets were never used. This has led to a new strategy being adopted. Today, when nets are distributed, they are also hung in place by those distributing the nets to make sure they will be used. This has made a big difference, as people start to see how nets will keep the mosquitoes away and gradually they appreciate the benefits of sleeping under a net. Besides the distribution of nets, people need to be trained on recognising the symptoms of the sickness as well. Often, people do not see the need to seek medical help when they have fever unless it gets really bad. In many cases, parents with young children respond too late and that is also one of the reasons why many young children die. So with pictures the government is trying to instruct the public.

In both the church work as well as the literacy work, we often advise people on how to take care of themselves and how to prevent common illnesses and diseases. For example, the common knowledge of needing to wash your hands with soap or the danger of high fever in children, is simply not there. Sometimes we invite community health nurses to our meetings to give instructions on health issues.

Community nurses instruct the women in the church on the importance of washing your hands with soap after using the toilet

A few weeks ago, travelling to one of our village churches, we came across another way of using old mosquito nets. Some children had hung the nets between the poles of a goal and so the old nets had found a new use.

Old mosquito nets have found a new use!