Ewura Adams Karim, a level 400 Theatre for Development student of the University of Ghana as part of his final year project visited the East Gonja municipality in the Northern Region of Ghana from 1st-4th November, 2018 with a team of medical professionals to touch hundreds of lives with a free health screening and health education initiative which he dubbed Health and Tourism, a social impact adventure to the North.
The team made a few stops at tourist sites located in the Brong Ahafo and Northern Regions of Ghana. Among the sites visited are the Boabeng Fiema Monkey Sanctuary, the Kintampo Waterfalls, Salaga Slave wells and baths, Salaga slave market and Salaga Slave ancestral cemetery.
The reason for the tourism bit to the project when asked the coordinator, he stated that the tourism was added as a part of the project to give project participants a feel of tourist sites that our country is blessed with and also to become familiar with challenges that people living in areas where these sites are located are faced with.
The project which was done in partnership with Reprocan Ghana screened hundreds of women and men with general health conditions and also students of the two senior high schools in the Municipality.
The team eventually narrowed it down to HIV test and counseling, Hepatitis B, Breast cancer, Malaria, Diabetes and prostrate in men above 45 years.
Patients who tested positive were given prescriptions. Others were also referred to the Salaga Municipal Hospital and the Tamale teaching hospital for advance treatment.
A short drama on the need to promote quality livelihood for women was also enacted at a durbar on the day of the screening. In attendance were the representatives of the Kpembewura and the Municipal Chief Executive of the East Gonja municipality.
Dr Felicia Owusu Ansah who is the Theatre for Development lecturer at the Department of Theatre Arts at the University of Ghana expressed her joy about the success of the project and the need for more people to venture into such positive initiatives.
As tradition demands, a courtesy call was paid on Kpembewura Bambange to enlightened him about the activities. He endorsed it by also participating in the screening exercise.
Activities wrapped up with a football match to strengthen the bond of unity among the people and to create further awareness on the project. Many benefited from this year’s exercise.
The project coordinator stated that this activity has been earmarked to be an annual activity aimed at empowering women and encouraging both men and women to take health checks seriously.
The charity event returns next year with a line up of activities to help the less privilege in society.
