Ghana has recorded significant increases in its coronavirus disease (COVID-19) case count and recoveries over the past two days, with 112 additional cases, bringing the total number of positive cases to 1,154.
The Ghana Health Service (GHS), in its latest update, said the number of recoveries had also seen some significant increase from 99 to 120 as of April 22, 2020.
The Director General of the GHS, Dr. Patrick Kumah Aboagye, who gave the update at a press briefing in Accra yesterday, indicated that the positive cases represented 1.5 per cent infection rate.
Out of the total number of cases recorded, 401 were from the general routine surveillance, while 638 were recorded among the population through the GHS enhanced surveillance activities popularly called Contact Tracing.
The remaining 115 cases were from travellers who were mandatorily quarantined in Accra and Tamale.
Dr. Aboagye said 131 were responding to treatment while four were in conditions categorized as critical or moderate. One patient is on a ventilator, according to Dr. Aboagye.
The country’s death toll still stands at nine. The last time there was a COVID-19 reported death was on April 18.
Recoveries
Explaining the data behind the recoveries, Dr. Aboagye said 82 out of the total number were from the Ga East Hospital.
He further indicated that 17 recoveries were recorded at the University of Ghana Medical Centre, eight (8) from the Ridge Regional Hospital, four (4) from the 37 Military Hospital, and one (1) from the Tema General Hospital.
He also noted that six of the recoveries were recorded from the Ashanti Region, one from Wa and another six from Tamale.
More Samples Tested
Speaking at the event, Professor William Ampofo, Head of Virology at the Noguchi Memorial Institute for Medical Research (NMIMR) at the University of Ghana, debunked media reports about the capacity of the centre to test for the virus.
He said the centre has the ability to test over 4,000 samples a day, using a simple multiplication testing method.
“We put them in pools of tens and test so in one testing you get 1,000 results,” he said.
According to Professor Ampofo, the centre has tested some 30,000 samples for COVID-19 in the past three days.
He said it was, therefore, not impossible for the centre to have tested 68,000 samples as said by President Akufo-Addo in his address on April 19.
He further noted that each test done follows a quality control procedure, from the sampling to the release of the test results.
“We use four different test kits of international standards to conduct our tests and we have also established quality assurance programme where we exchange samples with Kumasi Centre for Collaborative Research (KCCR) to verify the results,” he said.
By Jamila Akweley Okertchiri