Health News of Friday, 30 March 2012

Source: GNA

Ms Wilhelmina Okwabi, Deputy Director, Nutrition Department of Ghana Health Service, on Friday noted that Ghana has not done well in terms of scaling up interventions to improve upon the nutritional status of the citizenry.

She however admitted that, there have been pockets of success in various areas of interventions.

Ms Okwabi said, there are evidence of the increasing rate of malnutrition and obesity particularly among children as well as other nutritional related illnesses such as diabetes among the younger population.

Ms Okwabi, who was addressing a West African Health Organisation (WAHO) Peer Reviewing Meeting in Accra on Strengthening National Nutrition in West Africa, called for stakeholder support and political commitment towards the implementation of nutritional policies and programmes, to reduce malnutrition rates among the populace.

She said, challenges such as effective implementation and sustained impact backed by political commitment and fair share of the national budget remained elusive.

Ms Okwabi noted that, although nutrition was a critical item in the development status of a country, it had remained trapped in a low priority cycle in most sub Saharan African countries including Ghana.

She emphasised that, malnutritions complex determinants and its low visibility, as well as lack of political commitment and weak institutional and operational capacities at all levels of government were some of the biggest constraints.

Ms Okwabi explained that, the South-South Peer Review initiative which was sponsored by the World Bank and led by the WAHO of ECOWAS is aimed at enhancing policies and programmes through South-South exchange and learning.

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Ghana to scale up interventions to improve nutrition