Three agencies have committed to investing more than $158m to improve Ghana’s primary healthcare.
They are the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), which plan to invest up to US$135million through 2027, subject to approval, the Korea International Corporation Agency (KOICA), estimated approximately US$23 million, while Japan International Corporation Agency (JICA) is expected to provide technical support.
The three international organisations yesterday convened an inaugural meeting with the Ghana Health Service (GHS) in Accra, to advance agreement between them and the government in order to improve Ghana’s primary healthcare.
This follows a signing of Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) in July 2023, by the United States Ambassador to Ghana, Virginia Palmer, the Japanese Ambassador, Mochizuki Hisanobu, and the Korea’s Ambassador, Jung-Taek Lim, to as well strengthen Ghana’s global health security against future pandemic threat.
Speaking at the meeting, the KOICA country Director, Mr Dong Hyun Lee, said the tripartite partnership support three key areas, which were primary healthcare, health governance at the sub-national level and global security.
He said the partnership would further support and build on Ghana’s primary healthcare system at the Community-Based Health Planning and Services (CHPS), and health centres to strengthen the quality of health services.
“This meeting underscores our collective dedication to enhancing the primary healthcare system in the Northern Region. KOICA, JICA and USAID each bring unique strengths to this partnership.
It will enable us leverage our combined efforts in supporting key health priorities, and we are committed to this partnership with the aim of improving quality healthcare delivery in the country,” Mr Lee said.
The Chief Representative of JICA, Ms Momoko Suzuki, said the partnership offered an opportunity for all development partners to learn from this novel approach of having different actors, working in the same technical area.
He added that the partnership would mitigate all forms of duplications, and ensures synergy of interventions towards optimising health outcomes in the designated regions.
The USAID Mission Director, Ms Kimberly Rosen, added that the United States through USAID was pleased to partner the government, JICA and KOICA to build a more resilient health system.
The Director of Family Health Division of the Ghana Health Service, Dr Kofi Issah, said the government welcomes the efforts of the developing partners to help address challenges in the country’s health delivery.
BY BERNARD BENGHAN
