The Ghana Health Service’s website dedicated to updating Ghanaians on COVID-19 cases confirmed the case, saying the first case involves a 59-year old woman, resident in the United Kingdom who recently returned to Ghana and currently living in Kumasi.
The website said she “reported to a private hospital with the history of fever (temp of 39.1c), general malaise, cough and runny nose. Her condition was suspected to be COVID-19. Sample was subsequently collected and sent to KCCR and the report was received this early morning as positive for COVID-19.”
The second case involves a 61-year old Lebanese male trader resident in Kumasi.
According to the website, he felt unwell and reported to a health facility with fever (temp 39.4 c) and cough. The sample tested positive for COVID-19.
The confirmation of two more cases comes hours after the President had said the cases were nine.
Two earlier COVID-19 cases
The Ghana Health Service’s website had said the two additional cases which were also disclosed by the President earlier involved a 56-year-old Ghanaian who travelled back to Accra from the UK and a 33-year-old who also came in from a conference in UAE.
“On the 18th March, we received another report form NMIMR indicating two (2) more confirmed cases from the Greater Accra Region. Both are imported cases. One is a 56-year-old man, a Ghanaian who travelled back to Accra from a trip to UK about a week ago. The other is a 33-year-old Ghanaian, who returned to Accra from a conference in UAE. Both cases are receiving treatment in isolation.”
The Ghana Health Service website noted that no death has been recorded yet.
Contact-tracing figure now 399
It also added that 399 contacts have been identified as persons who came into contact with affected persons.
“There is no death, yesterday, we received notification from KCCR indicating two (2) newly confirmed in Kumasi, On contact tracing, a total of 399 contacts have been identified and are being followed up. Nineteen (19) of the contacts developed some forms of symptoms and samples have taken for laboratory testing. We have received results for 15 of them which are all negative for COVID-19 and we are awaiting results for four (4) of them. Currently, there is no death and all the nine (9) confirmed COVID-19 cases are being managed in isolation and are responding well to treatment.”
Health experts warn of more possible COVID-19 cases – Oppong Nkrumah
Ghana is likely to record more cases of COVID-19 within the next two weeks, Kojo Oppong Nkrumah has disclosed.
He said predictions by health experts are that the number of cases of the pandemic will rise within the above mentioned period before a likely decline of the spread of the disease.
Addressing the press on Wednesday, Mr. Oppong Nkrumah assured that the authorities have expressed readiness for any impending case and therefore called on Ghanaians to be calm and take precautionary measures seriously.
“The health experts tell us that the next two weeks are critical in determining whether or not we will get significant community spread. They tell us that, the general theory of pandemic management is that, often the numbers are likely to go up a bit before the situation gets better. Therefore, they are bracing for the possibility of some limited recordings of more cases in the medium term but they continue to assure us that, the systems they are putting together are such that we are able to control it and hold this virus in check,” he said.
