A publication by a Nigerian news portal, newsfeed.com on 11th June 2020, has it that COVID-19 isolation centre shortage has hit Ghana.
The story, which the portal claims it sourced from Opera News Hub, is going viral on social media, especially on WhatsApp platforms.
It states, “Ghana’s vigilance in embarking on contract tracing of infected persons of the novel Coronavirus has led to a massive infrastructural deficit in the management of the spiraling cases of the pandemic.
The story further indicates, “there are reports of the shortage of isolation centres in the Greater Accra Region this portal can report”.
The story goes on to explain that, “according to the reports available to this portal, case managers of the disease cannot readily find isolation centres for case management in the region and now considering entering into the Central Region to create more isolation centres to contain the situation of having to allow people to self- isolate”.
Fact-checkghana.com verified the report and found out that the story is false.
Explanation
After recording its first case of COVID-19 on 12th March 2020, Ghana’s case count has since increased with the Ghana Health Service bearing the primary responsibility for announcing case count updates in Ghana.
Isolation centres in the COVID-19 management cases are places where people who have come into contact with an infected person are kept away from the comfort of their homes and monitored to see if the disease would show symptoms.
This is done especially in the cases of asymptomatic carriers of the disease in the country.
In a telephone conversation with the Director General of the Ghana Health Service, Dr. Patrick Kumah-Aboagye, on the claims, he established emphatically that “ it is a lie.”
Also, there has not been any similar publication on any of the Ghanaian news portals after over 30 hours of publication of the story sighted by fact-checkghana.com.
Fact-checkghana.com further reached out to the National Information Contact Center powered by the Ministry of Information which also denied the claims.
It said there have not been plans to secure isolation centres in the Central Region to curb any shortages from Greater Accra.
Checks from Opera News Hub, where the story is sourced, equally did not state any authority to authenticate the claim.
As at 18th June, 12:00 GMT, Ghana has confirmed 12,590 cases with 8,114 being active, whilst total recoveries stand at 4, 410 and 66 fatalities, according to statistics from the website of the Ghana Health Service.
