Five persons have lost their lives in the Upper West Region following the outbreak of Yellow Fever in the Sissala West and Wa East Districts of the region.
Dr. Damien Punguyire, the Upper West Regional Director of Health Services who announced this in Wa on Friday identified the Ducie, Motigu, and Gurumbelle communities in the Wa East District and Zinni in the Sissala West District as some of the communities where the active cases had been picked-up with the casualties being children within the ages of one to ten years.
Dr. Punguyire disclosed this at a press briefing on the Yellow Fever outbreak and the COVID-19 vaccination exercise in the region in Wa on Friday.
He indicated that the Regional Health Directorate was supporting the affected districts to investigate and institute appropriate measures to control the outbreak.
“Vaccination is currently ongoing in the affected communities. A total of 2,545 persons aged six months to 60 years in the affected communities have been vaccinated representing 38 per cent of the targeted population (6,909) as at 17th November 2021”, Dr. Punguyire explained.
The Director said Yellow Fever was transmitted by an infected mosquito and urged the general public to get vaccinated against the disease as well as to prevent mosquito bites.
He also entreated the public to “report to the nearest health facility if you have a fever, yellowish discoloration of your eyes, general weakness, headache, nausea and vomiting” which were symptoms of the Yellow Fever disease.
Touching on the COVID-19 vaccination, the Director indicated that only 5.9 per cent of the region’s targeted population was fully vaccinated against the virus as of November 17, 2021.
“So far the region has received a total of 201,980 doses of three different types of vaccines and has administered 124,480 doses to 91,017 persons representing 19 per cent of the target population as of 17th November 2021”, he indicated.
He explained that the Regional Health Directorate was targeting to vaccinate 52 per cent of the region’s total population of about 887,000 people.
He, thus, urged the public to disregard the false speculation about the vaccine and to get the jab to boost their immune systems against the virus saying, “The vaccine is therefore safe and free for everybody within the target group”.
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