By Doreen Allotey
It is a normal Monday morning and workers are busy meandering through traffic to get to their offices so they can justify their visit to the bank at the end of the month.
It has been a busy weekend for most of them — socially. For some, Friday night was a pal's bachelors night party and anybody who has ever attended one of those nights knows what happens there. Saturday morning, they had to dash to the burial service of a classmates' mother, returned on time for a wedding service and ended up at the night club later in the night. Some virtually crawled home at dawn and those who were sloshed, slumped into bed with their clothes and shoes on.
Then, Sunday morning started with church service, drifted into an omutuo session in the afternoon and some visits going way into the evening and probably some all-night-church services.
Strange thing is, no matter how long one practices this routine, one really never gets used to it and begins the Monday feeling like an armed robber who has just escaped the wrath of an angry mob who wanted to lynch him. But one does all these in conformity to societal demands and norms. As the saying goes, if you have several farms you must tend them all.
The scenario painted above depicts the weekend routine of many workers. It even becomes more exacting when one has to travel many kilometres outside one’s place of abode to attend to these social calls. I have had the misfortune of attending funerals and weddings as far as Tumu and Takoradi on different occasions. Apart from the physical exhaustion, the impact on the already over-stretched pocket is obvious, especially in these days of high fuel accommodation and feeding costs, against the background of a global recession which some choose to call financial crunch where workers who used to be paid at the middle of the month now have a long agonising wait into the next month.
But what are friends and colleagues for, if not to be around in our moments of joy or sorrow? Who really wants a fair weather friend? Yet, these things take a nagging toll on our collective productivity as a work force. Of what use is a worker when he or she reports to work at the beginning of the week feeling very weak? The productivity of such a person by Wednesday can be anybody's guess. No wonder there is a high incidence of workers reporting sick,( actually nursing hangovers), playing truancy, malingering and absenteeism. For some it has become a stock-in-trade.
How then do we balance the equation? Will you respond to these social calls and go to work tired or rest over the weekend, go to work rejuvenated but be in the bad books of friends and relatives? Especially those friends who have been or will be there to hold you up when you are falling?
I think the way to go is to balance the act. You cannot respond to all social calls. Make a list according to priority and the level of friendship and attend to social calls according to this priority. Save sometime for yourself and take a little rest. The body needs rest to remain productive . And productivity justifies the pay cheque at the end of the month.
Tuesday, November 24, 2009
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
Mental health — Shifting focus from institutionalised care
By Doreen Allotey
Mental illness presents one of the most challenging moments that could confront a family. While the direct effects are obviously on the victim, its impact on the family as a whole is equally unpleasant.
The obvious ones are the high cost of seeking cure for a loved one and the stigmatisation of the entire family. Stories are told of how members of certain families are shunned by prospective suitors for the simple reason that some great uncle or auntie once suffered from a mental condition .
Perhaps, it is for this reason that most families, whether rich or poor would leave no stone unturned in their bid to seek cure for a mentally ill relative.
According to Dr Akwasi Osei, Chief Psychiatrist and Medical Director of the Accra Psychiatric Hospital, some of the common measures such families resort to include visiting prayer camps, hiding the patient in a room from the public eye (sometimes in chains) or sending the patient to a psychiatric hospital where they plead with the psychiatrist to keep him/her for a very long time. Even years after these patients have been treated and recovered, some relatives are just reluctant to admit them back into their homes and the patient is abandoned at the hospital.
Dr Osei has been dissatisfied with this situation which he describes as disturbing, and continues to appeal to families to come for their relatives who have recovered from the psychiatric hospitals.
The approach adopted in treating or maltreating the mentally ill is often informed by beliefs. Some of these beliefs are based on assumptions or the perception that mental illness is a spiritual ailment, a mystery and a curse. Most importantly also there is the lack of knowledge on the part of society that there is a scientific explanation for mental illness and that mental disorders can be medically and socially managed.
Though different methods are adopted to handle the situation, the common thread running through these thoughts seem to be, keeping the patient away from the community where he /she is thought to be a nuisance. This attitude has worsened the plight of the mentally ill in Ghana and contributed to their worsening stigmatisation. The stigmatisation is so rife that even health workers involved in the management of mental illness are also roped in and do not escape stigmatisation as one retired mental health nurse stated.
But the mentally ill are part of us, our society and most of us stand the risk of suffering from one mental disorder or the other in our lifetime.
According to Dr Osei, WHO estimates that as of 2005, there were 2.166million Ghanaians with mild to moderate mental illness with another 650,000 having severe forms of mental illness.
Accoding to him, “These are WHO estimates, based on about 10 per cent of every population world-wide having some form of mental illness”.
October 10 was World Mental Health Day, a day set aside by the World Health Organisation to draw attention to issues of mental health and the need to address them.
The theme for this year’s celebration is: Mental Health in Primary care: Enhancing Treatment and Promoting Mental Health.
It was intended to address the continuing need to “make mental health a global priority and stress the all too often neglected fact that mental health is an integral element of every individual’s overall health and well-being.
It is in line with the WHO’s definition of Health as “ A state of complete physical, mental and social well-being, and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity”.
The World Mental Health Day highlighted the opportunities and the challenges that integrating mental health services into the primary health care delivery system will present to people living with mental disorders and poor mental health, their families, caregivers and healthier professionals.
As explained by Dr Margaret Chan, Director-General of the World Health Organisation, for centuries, the illness of the mind has been treated as a social issue that is separate from any physical health issue. But mental health disorders do not happen in isolation and they frequently occur in relation to or alongside other medical conditions and as a response to many life situations. Examples of such conditions are heart disease, diabetes, cancer and neurological disorders.
It has been established that an individual’s medical issues and life circumstances do not affect just one area of the body. The way to go, therefore, in treating the individuals’ health is adopting a holistic and integrated manner to achieve positive outcomes.
In Ghana , the theme for this year’s celebration is very appropriate in view of the shift in focus from institutionalised care of the mentally ill to the integration of mental health with general healthcare at each level in the health system and to multi-sectoral liaison with the education, social welfare , criminal justice and non-governmental systems.
These are contained in the draft Mental Health Bill currently receiving attention at the Attorney General’s Department.
This shift in policy has also given rise to calls from various stockholders for the passage of a new mental health bill, which among other things, provides for the establishment of a Mental Health Authority which will have as its aim, the promotion of mental health and provision of humane care in a least restrictive environment. The authority is to provide mental health services at the primary healthcare level, among others.
Indeed Mental Healthcare in Ghana has come a long way from the 1888 Lunatic Asylum Ordinance, Cap 79, which became law and allowed custodial care for the mentally ill. This saw the building of the first asylum in 1906 at Asylum Down in Accra to decongest the prison where arrested mentally ill people were kept.
The ordinance remained in force with little modification until the Mental Health Act of 1972, (NCRD 30) was enacted. NRCD 30 focused mainly on institutional care, but was an improvement on the ordinance because it also took account of the patient, the property of the patient and voluntary treatment. NRCD 30 has never been amended even though attempts were made to revise it in 1996.
So from a situation where the mentally ill were locked up in an institution, a number of stakeholders have been at the forefront of advocating the passage of the bill into law because it seeks to improve the plight of the mentally ill in our society.
The mentally ill have suffered abuse of their rights as human beings, been stigmatised, and to seek their welfare, there is the need for the bill to be passed into law because that, it is hoped, will encourage the early identification and prompt treatment of mental disorder at the primary care level and the district general hospital level. This in turn will discourage admission to the three state-run psychiatric institutions which are often far from most homes and, therefore, difficult and expensive for families to visit regularly.
BasicNeeds Ghana is a non-governmental organisation which has been collaborating with various government institutions in seeking the welfare of mentally ill patients and pushing for the passage of the mental health bill into law.
This organisation focuses on initiatives in mental health and development.
According to the Country Programme Manager of BasicNeeds, Mr Badimak Peter Yaro, the organisation has been working to bring about a lasting change in the lives of mentally ill people around the world.
Mr Yaro explains that in Ghana, BasicNeeds recognised that the mentally ill were stigmatised by their local communities and had become marginalised as a result.
He said it was very difficult for the mentally ill to find employment, which therefore placed an enormous financial burden on their benefactors.
Mr Yaro explained that the lack of money often prevented the mentally ill from accessing treatment, and that further worsened their illness and increased stress on caretakers.
The organisation has programmes in both Accra and northern Ghana. It also carries out research in mental health and develops mental health policies in favour of people with mental illness.
As a development-oriented organisation, BasicNeeds’s approach has always emphasised community treatment and rehabilitation.
Through its operations, BasicNeeds addresses not only issues of treatment and rehabilitation which the global awareness theme for the 2009 World Mental Health Day campaign on enhancing treatment emphasises, but also the fundamental issues of human rights denial and violations that mentally ill people and their carers are subjected to.
The BasicNeeds Ghana programme began in 2002 with a pilot project in northern Ghana which focussed on access to treatment and sustainable livelihood programmes through partnerships with the Mental Health Unit and community-based organisations.
In all, 16,691 people with mental disorders have benefited from BasicNeeds Ghana’s activities since its inception.
Added to this, 16,024 people with mental disorders receive regular psychiatric treatment by attending outreach clinics organised quarterly in four sub-metros in Accra, namely Ashiedu Keteke, Ablekuma, Okaikoi and Ayawaso and in the three northern regions.
The work of BasicNeeds has resulted in the stabilisation of 14,208 people with mental disorders, out of which 12,257 are engaged in productive work.
The organisation has financially assisted or provided equipment for 3,603 of such people to engage in self-employment that enables them to earn some income.
It has been organising workshops for media personnel in Ghana, aimed at providing information on mental illness, with the view to making mental health issues better understood and enable them cover and report on mental health and development-related issues.
To discourage stigmatisation, bring some relief to families of the mentally ill and improve care for the mentally ill, the passage of the Mental Health Bill seems to be the way out.
Mental illness presents one of the most challenging moments that could confront a family. While the direct effects are obviously on the victim, its impact on the family as a whole is equally unpleasant.
The obvious ones are the high cost of seeking cure for a loved one and the stigmatisation of the entire family. Stories are told of how members of certain families are shunned by prospective suitors for the simple reason that some great uncle or auntie once suffered from a mental condition .
Perhaps, it is for this reason that most families, whether rich or poor would leave no stone unturned in their bid to seek cure for a mentally ill relative.
According to Dr Akwasi Osei, Chief Psychiatrist and Medical Director of the Accra Psychiatric Hospital, some of the common measures such families resort to include visiting prayer camps, hiding the patient in a room from the public eye (sometimes in chains) or sending the patient to a psychiatric hospital where they plead with the psychiatrist to keep him/her for a very long time. Even years after these patients have been treated and recovered, some relatives are just reluctant to admit them back into their homes and the patient is abandoned at the hospital.
Dr Osei has been dissatisfied with this situation which he describes as disturbing, and continues to appeal to families to come for their relatives who have recovered from the psychiatric hospitals.
The approach adopted in treating or maltreating the mentally ill is often informed by beliefs. Some of these beliefs are based on assumptions or the perception that mental illness is a spiritual ailment, a mystery and a curse. Most importantly also there is the lack of knowledge on the part of society that there is a scientific explanation for mental illness and that mental disorders can be medically and socially managed.
Though different methods are adopted to handle the situation, the common thread running through these thoughts seem to be, keeping the patient away from the community where he /she is thought to be a nuisance. This attitude has worsened the plight of the mentally ill in Ghana and contributed to their worsening stigmatisation. The stigmatisation is so rife that even health workers involved in the management of mental illness are also roped in and do not escape stigmatisation as one retired mental health nurse stated.
But the mentally ill are part of us, our society and most of us stand the risk of suffering from one mental disorder or the other in our lifetime.
According to Dr Osei, WHO estimates that as of 2005, there were 2.166million Ghanaians with mild to moderate mental illness with another 650,000 having severe forms of mental illness.
Accoding to him, “These are WHO estimates, based on about 10 per cent of every population world-wide having some form of mental illness”.
October 10 was World Mental Health Day, a day set aside by the World Health Organisation to draw attention to issues of mental health and the need to address them.
The theme for this year’s celebration is: Mental Health in Primary care: Enhancing Treatment and Promoting Mental Health.
It was intended to address the continuing need to “make mental health a global priority and stress the all too often neglected fact that mental health is an integral element of every individual’s overall health and well-being.
It is in line with the WHO’s definition of Health as “ A state of complete physical, mental and social well-being, and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity”.
The World Mental Health Day highlighted the opportunities and the challenges that integrating mental health services into the primary health care delivery system will present to people living with mental disorders and poor mental health, their families, caregivers and healthier professionals.
As explained by Dr Margaret Chan, Director-General of the World Health Organisation, for centuries, the illness of the mind has been treated as a social issue that is separate from any physical health issue. But mental health disorders do not happen in isolation and they frequently occur in relation to or alongside other medical conditions and as a response to many life situations. Examples of such conditions are heart disease, diabetes, cancer and neurological disorders.
It has been established that an individual’s medical issues and life circumstances do not affect just one area of the body. The way to go, therefore, in treating the individuals’ health is adopting a holistic and integrated manner to achieve positive outcomes.
In Ghana , the theme for this year’s celebration is very appropriate in view of the shift in focus from institutionalised care of the mentally ill to the integration of mental health with general healthcare at each level in the health system and to multi-sectoral liaison with the education, social welfare , criminal justice and non-governmental systems.
These are contained in the draft Mental Health Bill currently receiving attention at the Attorney General’s Department.
This shift in policy has also given rise to calls from various stockholders for the passage of a new mental health bill, which among other things, provides for the establishment of a Mental Health Authority which will have as its aim, the promotion of mental health and provision of humane care in a least restrictive environment. The authority is to provide mental health services at the primary healthcare level, among others.
Indeed Mental Healthcare in Ghana has come a long way from the 1888 Lunatic Asylum Ordinance, Cap 79, which became law and allowed custodial care for the mentally ill. This saw the building of the first asylum in 1906 at Asylum Down in Accra to decongest the prison where arrested mentally ill people were kept.
The ordinance remained in force with little modification until the Mental Health Act of 1972, (NCRD 30) was enacted. NRCD 30 focused mainly on institutional care, but was an improvement on the ordinance because it also took account of the patient, the property of the patient and voluntary treatment. NRCD 30 has never been amended even though attempts were made to revise it in 1996.
So from a situation where the mentally ill were locked up in an institution, a number of stakeholders have been at the forefront of advocating the passage of the bill into law because it seeks to improve the plight of the mentally ill in our society.
The mentally ill have suffered abuse of their rights as human beings, been stigmatised, and to seek their welfare, there is the need for the bill to be passed into law because that, it is hoped, will encourage the early identification and prompt treatment of mental disorder at the primary care level and the district general hospital level. This in turn will discourage admission to the three state-run psychiatric institutions which are often far from most homes and, therefore, difficult and expensive for families to visit regularly.
BasicNeeds Ghana is a non-governmental organisation which has been collaborating with various government institutions in seeking the welfare of mentally ill patients and pushing for the passage of the mental health bill into law.
This organisation focuses on initiatives in mental health and development.
According to the Country Programme Manager of BasicNeeds, Mr Badimak Peter Yaro, the organisation has been working to bring about a lasting change in the lives of mentally ill people around the world.
Mr Yaro explains that in Ghana, BasicNeeds recognised that the mentally ill were stigmatised by their local communities and had become marginalised as a result.
He said it was very difficult for the mentally ill to find employment, which therefore placed an enormous financial burden on their benefactors.
Mr Yaro explained that the lack of money often prevented the mentally ill from accessing treatment, and that further worsened their illness and increased stress on caretakers.
The organisation has programmes in both Accra and northern Ghana. It also carries out research in mental health and develops mental health policies in favour of people with mental illness.
As a development-oriented organisation, BasicNeeds’s approach has always emphasised community treatment and rehabilitation.
Through its operations, BasicNeeds addresses not only issues of treatment and rehabilitation which the global awareness theme for the 2009 World Mental Health Day campaign on enhancing treatment emphasises, but also the fundamental issues of human rights denial and violations that mentally ill people and their carers are subjected to.
The BasicNeeds Ghana programme began in 2002 with a pilot project in northern Ghana which focussed on access to treatment and sustainable livelihood programmes through partnerships with the Mental Health Unit and community-based organisations.
In all, 16,691 people with mental disorders have benefited from BasicNeeds Ghana’s activities since its inception.
Added to this, 16,024 people with mental disorders receive regular psychiatric treatment by attending outreach clinics organised quarterly in four sub-metros in Accra, namely Ashiedu Keteke, Ablekuma, Okaikoi and Ayawaso and in the three northern regions.
The work of BasicNeeds has resulted in the stabilisation of 14,208 people with mental disorders, out of which 12,257 are engaged in productive work.
The organisation has financially assisted or provided equipment for 3,603 of such people to engage in self-employment that enables them to earn some income.
It has been organising workshops for media personnel in Ghana, aimed at providing information on mental illness, with the view to making mental health issues better understood and enable them cover and report on mental health and development-related issues.
To discourage stigmatisation, bring some relief to families of the mentally ill and improve care for the mentally ill, the passage of the Mental Health Bill seems to be the way out.
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
Consumer protection in Ghana — who cares?
By Doreen Allotey
MANY of us are so familiar with the popular notice posted in some shops which boldly states : Goods sold are not returnable, to the extent that we seem to take it as one of the principles in commerce.
The notice is courageously displayed in all manner of shops — big, small, local or foreign owned. And it comes with no qualification. The vendor would not take back a product purchased even if the flaw is detected immediately after the purchase.
We live in a society where the majority of us do not know our rights as consumers. As a result, we are always short-changed or cheated. Otherwise how can this notice — goods sold are not returnable— which presupposes that the vendor knows that there is a high probability that the goods on sale may not meet the customers’ satisfaction and may be returned, be allowed to stay!
The cheating of consumers does not only have to do with the purchase of goods; it extends to the provision of unsatisfactory services— services provided by individuals, institutions and public corporations including our hospitals.
This phenomenon has invariably affected our quality of life as a people since we do not get value for our money. The most worrisome part of it is the effect of such attitude on our health, especially because of fake drugs, wrong labelling, no labelling at all and ambiguous expiry dates. It is easy to know when unfair pricing, in fact obscene overpricing, has taken place. One only needs to walk one block away from a shop to find the same item manufactured by the same supplier commanding markedly different prices.
In some instances the vendor will sell at more than 100 per cent mark-up with the mentality that the seller may be lucky to meet a consumer who may be deceived.
In our local markets, this display of unfair treatment by traders who refuse to replace defective products can be carried to the extreme. They may, according to how they feel, grudgingly give you a replacement after they have tossed you back and forth. If you try to exchange an item in the morning, the excuse is that if the item is exchanged all customers will “misbehave” towards them that day.
Consumers suffer from many other unjust practices. A typical example is when traders dishonestly pass inferior products off as originals. The quality of consumer items with international brand names such as Rolex and Pierre Cardin and some designer goods such as Fendi, Dolce and Gabbana (D&G) which are imported from the Far East cannot be assured. Yet the vendor would not explain to the ignorant consumer issues about durability, reliability and even functionality. Vendors are also fond of making unsubstantiated claims about their wares. They are not alone in this. Even some reputable manufacturers and distributors of medicinal preparations and food products exaggerate the benefits one can derive from the use of their products. These benefits have never been proven but by repeatedly stating the “goodness” through advertisements and promotions the consumer is swayed into buying such items.
The safety of items, especially of products that are consumed and electrical gadgets such as kitchen equipment is important to all households. That is why they must be adequately labelled. For food items and drugs, the ingredients and date by which they should have been consumed should be stated clearly in a language that the consumer understands.
In the case of gadgets, an instructional manual directing/explaining their operations must be provided. But how many times are these conditions adhered to? Gadgets are sold without a competent technician demonstrating their use to the customer. There are many other examples where the customer is blatantly cheated. Pricing of utilities such as electricity, water and telephone services are the most common. Customers have the perception that the formula for calculating the electricity bill which households receive is a fraud. It contains an element termed “street lighting” which is charged irrespective of the fact that many streets are in perpetual darkness. Worst of all is the frequent power fluctuations causing damage to equipment and spoiling food items being kept in freezers. The story about water is a vexatious one. Customers who continuously have dry taps are given bills. Mobile networks charge and provide poor connectivity yet this is becoming acceptable. The question is : What consequences do the providers suffer?
To protect the consumer, most governments the world over have set up regulatory bodies to protect the interests of consumers and to ensure that the standards and the ethics of a particular sector are maintained. Thus, there used to be the Prices and Incomes Board to regulate prices. What has caused the demise of this body? There are some regulatory authorities in the country. These include the Public Regulatory Commission (PURC), the Energy Commission, Environmental Protection Agency, Ghana Tourist Board, Food and Drugs Board, National Petroleum Authority and Forestry Commission.
The Ghana Standards Board ensures standards for products which have its certification mark, but what about others?
The hard fact remains that there is no real consumer protection in the country. As a result, unsatisfied consumers resort to the letters columns of newspapers to make complaints hoping that they would get some redress. Consumer protection societies which operate on the same principles as civil societies are very strong in some advanced countries. They form the front-line vanguard for protecting consumer rights. Attempts were made about a decade ago with the collaboration of the Ghana Standards Board, to form a Ghana Consumer Society . Once a while mention is made in the media of this civil organisation. It is, however, difficult to see what impact it has made so far in pursuing cases.
In an interview, the Executive Director of the Ghana Standards Board, Mr Adu G. Darkwa, said that the board had been carrying out programmes aimed at creating consumer awareness on things to look out for in detecting goods of questionable character.
He said the board was currently arranging with tertiary institutions, a programme to teach students “ standards” in various disciplines before they graduate.
He explained that standards often provided the basis for national legislation and certification schemes and could, therefore, be effective tools in consumer protection but he made it clear that the board had no mandate to prosecute.
An American civil lawyer called Ralph Nader is usually given credit for raising consumer awareness in America and held as an icon. His efforts have culminated in Consumer Law which is run as a course in higher institutions to the degree level. Some Ghanaian lawyers may have pursued this course but how has that contributed to consumer awareness in this country?
Enquiries about the Ghana Consumer Protection Society from a man who used to be a very active member in the mid-1990s resulted in the answer : " I have lost touch". If it still exists, Ghanaians need it more than ever before since a free market has made the country the dumping site for all kinds of goods, including those of very doubtful character, even from a sheer glimpse of its features.
The government, through its institutions is supposed to play a lead role in protecting consumers through laws, education and advocacy.
The need to encourage strong consumer awareness is now; because our markets are inundated with all sorts of goods .There are real challenges in the marketplace.
The Ministry of Trade and Industry planned a Trade Sector Support programme which was to last from 2006 to 2010. In the executive summary of the programme document, it is spelt out, among other things, the need for consumer protection.
The document states that the purpose of such a consumer protection project is “to create an environment that affords protection to consumers and enhances consumer welfare”.
It further states that to ensure this requires certain outputs which have been outlined as the development of a consumer protection policy, the enactment of a framework law on consumer protection, the establishment of a consumer protection authority and mechanisms and instruments for delivering speedy redress.
Therefore under this project was to be a consumer protection policy and framework law which will lead to the establishment of a Consumer Protection Authority including small claims courts to facilitate consumer redress.
This project has not been undertaken, leaving the consumer in a current state of helplessness.
As we celebrate World Tourism Week, it is obvious that the ministry needs to rededicate itself to this project. Ghanaian consumers and tourists need to be protected.
People are simply taking the rights of consumers for granted. But for now, how about a successfully prosecuted and publicised case of consumer rights abuse in court? That would definitely serve as some form of awareness. It looks like consumers are going to be seeing the notice— Goods once sold are not returnable — for a long time more and the consumer will continue to be given a raw deal. This situation definitely needs to change.
MANY of us are so familiar with the popular notice posted in some shops which boldly states : Goods sold are not returnable, to the extent that we seem to take it as one of the principles in commerce.
The notice is courageously displayed in all manner of shops — big, small, local or foreign owned. And it comes with no qualification. The vendor would not take back a product purchased even if the flaw is detected immediately after the purchase.
We live in a society where the majority of us do not know our rights as consumers. As a result, we are always short-changed or cheated. Otherwise how can this notice — goods sold are not returnable— which presupposes that the vendor knows that there is a high probability that the goods on sale may not meet the customers’ satisfaction and may be returned, be allowed to stay!
The cheating of consumers does not only have to do with the purchase of goods; it extends to the provision of unsatisfactory services— services provided by individuals, institutions and public corporations including our hospitals.
This phenomenon has invariably affected our quality of life as a people since we do not get value for our money. The most worrisome part of it is the effect of such attitude on our health, especially because of fake drugs, wrong labelling, no labelling at all and ambiguous expiry dates. It is easy to know when unfair pricing, in fact obscene overpricing, has taken place. One only needs to walk one block away from a shop to find the same item manufactured by the same supplier commanding markedly different prices.
In some instances the vendor will sell at more than 100 per cent mark-up with the mentality that the seller may be lucky to meet a consumer who may be deceived.
In our local markets, this display of unfair treatment by traders who refuse to replace defective products can be carried to the extreme. They may, according to how they feel, grudgingly give you a replacement after they have tossed you back and forth. If you try to exchange an item in the morning, the excuse is that if the item is exchanged all customers will “misbehave” towards them that day.
Consumers suffer from many other unjust practices. A typical example is when traders dishonestly pass inferior products off as originals. The quality of consumer items with international brand names such as Rolex and Pierre Cardin and some designer goods such as Fendi, Dolce and Gabbana (D&G) which are imported from the Far East cannot be assured. Yet the vendor would not explain to the ignorant consumer issues about durability, reliability and even functionality. Vendors are also fond of making unsubstantiated claims about their wares. They are not alone in this. Even some reputable manufacturers and distributors of medicinal preparations and food products exaggerate the benefits one can derive from the use of their products. These benefits have never been proven but by repeatedly stating the “goodness” through advertisements and promotions the consumer is swayed into buying such items.
The safety of items, especially of products that are consumed and electrical gadgets such as kitchen equipment is important to all households. That is why they must be adequately labelled. For food items and drugs, the ingredients and date by which they should have been consumed should be stated clearly in a language that the consumer understands.
In the case of gadgets, an instructional manual directing/explaining their operations must be provided. But how many times are these conditions adhered to? Gadgets are sold without a competent technician demonstrating their use to the customer. There are many other examples where the customer is blatantly cheated. Pricing of utilities such as electricity, water and telephone services are the most common. Customers have the perception that the formula for calculating the electricity bill which households receive is a fraud. It contains an element termed “street lighting” which is charged irrespective of the fact that many streets are in perpetual darkness. Worst of all is the frequent power fluctuations causing damage to equipment and spoiling food items being kept in freezers. The story about water is a vexatious one. Customers who continuously have dry taps are given bills. Mobile networks charge and provide poor connectivity yet this is becoming acceptable. The question is : What consequences do the providers suffer?
To protect the consumer, most governments the world over have set up regulatory bodies to protect the interests of consumers and to ensure that the standards and the ethics of a particular sector are maintained. Thus, there used to be the Prices and Incomes Board to regulate prices. What has caused the demise of this body? There are some regulatory authorities in the country. These include the Public Regulatory Commission (PURC), the Energy Commission, Environmental Protection Agency, Ghana Tourist Board, Food and Drugs Board, National Petroleum Authority and Forestry Commission.
The Ghana Standards Board ensures standards for products which have its certification mark, but what about others?
The hard fact remains that there is no real consumer protection in the country. As a result, unsatisfied consumers resort to the letters columns of newspapers to make complaints hoping that they would get some redress. Consumer protection societies which operate on the same principles as civil societies are very strong in some advanced countries. They form the front-line vanguard for protecting consumer rights. Attempts were made about a decade ago with the collaboration of the Ghana Standards Board, to form a Ghana Consumer Society . Once a while mention is made in the media of this civil organisation. It is, however, difficult to see what impact it has made so far in pursuing cases.
In an interview, the Executive Director of the Ghana Standards Board, Mr Adu G. Darkwa, said that the board had been carrying out programmes aimed at creating consumer awareness on things to look out for in detecting goods of questionable character.
He said the board was currently arranging with tertiary institutions, a programme to teach students “ standards” in various disciplines before they graduate.
He explained that standards often provided the basis for national legislation and certification schemes and could, therefore, be effective tools in consumer protection but he made it clear that the board had no mandate to prosecute.
An American civil lawyer called Ralph Nader is usually given credit for raising consumer awareness in America and held as an icon. His efforts have culminated in Consumer Law which is run as a course in higher institutions to the degree level. Some Ghanaian lawyers may have pursued this course but how has that contributed to consumer awareness in this country?
Enquiries about the Ghana Consumer Protection Society from a man who used to be a very active member in the mid-1990s resulted in the answer : " I have lost touch". If it still exists, Ghanaians need it more than ever before since a free market has made the country the dumping site for all kinds of goods, including those of very doubtful character, even from a sheer glimpse of its features.
The government, through its institutions is supposed to play a lead role in protecting consumers through laws, education and advocacy.
The need to encourage strong consumer awareness is now; because our markets are inundated with all sorts of goods .There are real challenges in the marketplace.
The Ministry of Trade and Industry planned a Trade Sector Support programme which was to last from 2006 to 2010. In the executive summary of the programme document, it is spelt out, among other things, the need for consumer protection.
The document states that the purpose of such a consumer protection project is “to create an environment that affords protection to consumers and enhances consumer welfare”.
It further states that to ensure this requires certain outputs which have been outlined as the development of a consumer protection policy, the enactment of a framework law on consumer protection, the establishment of a consumer protection authority and mechanisms and instruments for delivering speedy redress.
Therefore under this project was to be a consumer protection policy and framework law which will lead to the establishment of a Consumer Protection Authority including small claims courts to facilitate consumer redress.
This project has not been undertaken, leaving the consumer in a current state of helplessness.
As we celebrate World Tourism Week, it is obvious that the ministry needs to rededicate itself to this project. Ghanaian consumers and tourists need to be protected.
People are simply taking the rights of consumers for granted. But for now, how about a successfully prosecuted and publicised case of consumer rights abuse in court? That would definitely serve as some form of awareness. It looks like consumers are going to be seeing the notice— Goods once sold are not returnable — for a long time more and the consumer will continue to be given a raw deal. This situation definitely needs to change.
Friday, September 25, 2009
Agbogbloshie market— The good, the bad and the ugly
By Doreen Allotey
IT is a Friday morning, a market day and as usual, I have arrived like most women residents in Accra to purchase the family’s food supplies for the week. An all familiar scene, yet difficult to get used to greets me as I meander through the market.
Discarded pure water sachets and other used polythene material as well as, empty tins, pieces of foodstuffs in various stages of decomposition vie for space with vegetables strewn on the ground. Fetid water weep out of sacks of cassava dough and flies busily feast on smoked fish and other meat products while truck pushers fight for space with human traffic. The end result- a mixture of filth, stench and cacophony of noise. This is Agbogbloshie, one of Accra’s biggest foodstuff markets.
Agbogbloshie is all that expanse of land in Central Accra stretching from Domod Aluminium Company to Sikkens Paint. History has it that, following the demolition of Makola No.1 in the early 1980s, a water-logged portion of Agbogbloshie which was settled on mainly by squatters was converted to a market to resettle the displaced Makola traders.
It is quite a big market and its proximity to the railway station makes it possible for customers to get fresh foodstuffs from up-country . Again, its location ensures that it is accessible to people in various parts of Accra.
Notwithstanding the heavy vehicular and human traffic customers prefer to shop at Agbogbloshie because of the comparatively cheaper prices of foodstuff and other items.
Despite its popularity and good patronage, the Agbogbloshie market is beset with some problems which mainly has to do with its structures, facilities and attitude of traders, visitors and customers.
It is quite tough for customers to find space to park because the available parking lot is almost always full.
Moving through the stalls is quite difficult; there are “sub-stalls” infront , beside and at the sides of regular stalls creating obstruction. The market stalls are also used for domestic accommodation, a case of what sociologists term creative homelessness.
Sitting behind their wares , some of these market women will just throw their cover cloth over their shoulders , reach for a container and urinate in it and without washing hands, they will gladly serve you. They are full of energy as they continue to enthusiastically call out to customers to buy their wares. “ Sweetheart, won’t you get some tomatoes? How about onions? Is my name not on the list?—They cry out to those customers who read from a shop list as they buy from the market. So polite sound these traders, but if you dare pull down any of their wares mistakenly, you will see the very different part of them. Fights easily break out in this market as traders fight over customers for more sales. Such attitudes have sometimes resulted in avoidable conflicts. The recent clashes at Agbogbloshie in which some people lost their lives is a typical example.
Appropriate storage facilities are not in place as frozen chicken is displayed on trays placed on tables. Frozen meat could be left in the hot sun almost the whole day until evening when they may be sent back into cold storage. As dusk approaches, prices of perishable food become cheaper and some customers specialise in waiting to buy at that time.
It is very difficult to tell whether the food item one is buying is expired or not . How can we tell whether sugar being sold from a basin has expired or not? In any case, if we do not buy it in this manner, it will be used to make dough nuts for us!
Palm oil and other oils are sold from unlabelled containers making it impossible for the customer to know the brand name of what is being bought.
Weights and measures do not seem to apply here. Where scales are used to weigh meat and other items, the suspicion is that they are doctored to weigh heavy. Similarly, the olonka or the American tin used to measure your gari or kontonte measure may have been pushed in at the bottom to reduce the volume. The women stuff baskets used to pack tomatoes for sale with grass and paper all in the bid to deceive customers about quantity. And because there are no price tags, the vendors expect you to bargain for everything. Sometimes bargaining can produce a thrill but invariably the vendor is cheated. Added to this, bargaining can be time wasting.
Negative effects of practices
The insanitary conditions could cause a general epidemic that could spread to households that shop for food from this market. It is for fear of a situation such as this that the market was closed down not too long ago for renovations but this has not changed the conditions.
The contamination of food with bacteria that multiplies quickly in the humid environment makes food poisoning a possibility and some of the vegetables lose their state of freshness and nutritive values as a result of the way they are handled. Dry powdered food such as konkonte and gari are left at the mercy of the dusty wind during the dry season is certainly not healthy.
Dr David Nortey , Head of the Korle Bu Polyclinic, who sees to patients from Agbogbloshie . The common ailments they present are water- borne diseases like cholera , diarrhoea and typhoid. Added to these are other diseases like worm infestations, tuberculosis and injuries as a result of fights.
He is not surprised about such cases which he attributes to the insanitary conditions in the area. So for those of us who relish buying from that market, we stand the risk of buying typhoid and cholera to our homes.
Dr Nortey explains that the overcrowded nature of the area which does not allow good ventilation accounts for the high prevalence of tuberculosis while the choked gutters and drains are a very conducive place for the breeding of malaria.
The cluttered stalls and lanes blocked within the market means that in the event of fire-out break there is no access for fire engines.
Challenges
The Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA) is facing huge challenges of administering the market. It is overwhelmed with ensuring sanitation in the area.
As Mrs Rosemond Okpoti -Israel, Head of the Market Unit of the AMA puts it , the AMA has sweepers but the heavy influx of people to and fro the market make their job insignificant.
They sweep everyday but people sell in the night even when the market has officially closed so by day break the whole place is littered with discarded food stuff, sachet water and polythene bags.
The Ministry of Health has a unit at the market that sees to maintaining hygiene in the market. But the staff of this unit work from 8a.m to 5p.m.This means that the number of people who sleep in the market cannot be checked on .
Acts that offend the AMA’s (Public Markets) Bye Laws range from littering to selling or purchasing goods or stock near established markets other than approved places or erecting stalls at places other than the established markets . Offenders are liable on conviction.
The laws also require “all AMA tenants at the market to insure their properties against fire , theft, burglary or other foreseeable contingencies” and No occupier of any store in the market shall sublet or share such store, except with the written consent of the Assembly.
These bye -laws that regulate the market can be found in the Local Government Bulletin of September 1, 1995. Section 79 which is the Public markets bye- laws states that “ a district assembly shall make bye laws for the purpose of any function conferred upon it. The bye- laws specify as penalty, a fine not exceeding GH¢20 or a term of imprisonment not exceeding six months or both. It further specifies a penalty not exceeding 20Gp for each day on which the offence is continued after written notice of the conviction has been served on the offender in the case of a continuing offence.
Fine laws but are they being respected?
The city guards of the AMA work from 6a.m. to 6p.m. During this period , they are able to check users of the market. According to Mrs Okpoti-Israel, they have been taking people to court for breaking sanitation laws for instance but after 6p.m. When they close, the laws are flouted.
In spite of these negative practices and the potential health implications, Agbogbloshie remains relevant in the life of most households in Accra. It is from here that the smaller markets get their supplies for retailing and prices are considered moderate . Also worrisome is the fact that the insanitary conditions in this market is similar to what pertains in almost all markets I have visited in the country.
Suggestions for improving the market
It is for these reasons that efforts must be made to improve conditions in the market. The AMA needs to intensify its educational campaign on the need for maintaining hygiene at the markets and there is also the need to introduce modernity into the operations of the market women. The market queens could be used as change agents to ensure a change in attitude .
There should be regular visits by food inspectors; displaying of items such as oranges, plantains etc. on the bare floor should be prohibited and customers s are advised to wash such items before they even peel them. There should be no compromise; unauthorised structures that have been added to the stalls should be demolished to make way for easy movement within the market. The Ghana Standards Board has a role to play by introducing to the women advantages of weights and measures.
If Agbogbloshie market should remain where we get our food supplies, then sanitary conditions there should be ensured. That will be no luxury because it is our health that is at stake.
IT is a Friday morning, a market day and as usual, I have arrived like most women residents in Accra to purchase the family’s food supplies for the week. An all familiar scene, yet difficult to get used to greets me as I meander through the market.
Discarded pure water sachets and other used polythene material as well as, empty tins, pieces of foodstuffs in various stages of decomposition vie for space with vegetables strewn on the ground. Fetid water weep out of sacks of cassava dough and flies busily feast on smoked fish and other meat products while truck pushers fight for space with human traffic. The end result- a mixture of filth, stench and cacophony of noise. This is Agbogbloshie, one of Accra’s biggest foodstuff markets.
Agbogbloshie is all that expanse of land in Central Accra stretching from Domod Aluminium Company to Sikkens Paint. History has it that, following the demolition of Makola No.1 in the early 1980s, a water-logged portion of Agbogbloshie which was settled on mainly by squatters was converted to a market to resettle the displaced Makola traders.
It is quite a big market and its proximity to the railway station makes it possible for customers to get fresh foodstuffs from up-country . Again, its location ensures that it is accessible to people in various parts of Accra.
Notwithstanding the heavy vehicular and human traffic customers prefer to shop at Agbogbloshie because of the comparatively cheaper prices of foodstuff and other items.
Despite its popularity and good patronage, the Agbogbloshie market is beset with some problems which mainly has to do with its structures, facilities and attitude of traders, visitors and customers.
It is quite tough for customers to find space to park because the available parking lot is almost always full.
Moving through the stalls is quite difficult; there are “sub-stalls” infront , beside and at the sides of regular stalls creating obstruction. The market stalls are also used for domestic accommodation, a case of what sociologists term creative homelessness.
Sitting behind their wares , some of these market women will just throw their cover cloth over their shoulders , reach for a container and urinate in it and without washing hands, they will gladly serve you. They are full of energy as they continue to enthusiastically call out to customers to buy their wares. “ Sweetheart, won’t you get some tomatoes? How about onions? Is my name not on the list?—They cry out to those customers who read from a shop list as they buy from the market. So polite sound these traders, but if you dare pull down any of their wares mistakenly, you will see the very different part of them. Fights easily break out in this market as traders fight over customers for more sales. Such attitudes have sometimes resulted in avoidable conflicts. The recent clashes at Agbogbloshie in which some people lost their lives is a typical example.
Appropriate storage facilities are not in place as frozen chicken is displayed on trays placed on tables. Frozen meat could be left in the hot sun almost the whole day until evening when they may be sent back into cold storage. As dusk approaches, prices of perishable food become cheaper and some customers specialise in waiting to buy at that time.
It is very difficult to tell whether the food item one is buying is expired or not . How can we tell whether sugar being sold from a basin has expired or not? In any case, if we do not buy it in this manner, it will be used to make dough nuts for us!
Palm oil and other oils are sold from unlabelled containers making it impossible for the customer to know the brand name of what is being bought.
Weights and measures do not seem to apply here. Where scales are used to weigh meat and other items, the suspicion is that they are doctored to weigh heavy. Similarly, the olonka or the American tin used to measure your gari or kontonte measure may have been pushed in at the bottom to reduce the volume. The women stuff baskets used to pack tomatoes for sale with grass and paper all in the bid to deceive customers about quantity. And because there are no price tags, the vendors expect you to bargain for everything. Sometimes bargaining can produce a thrill but invariably the vendor is cheated. Added to this, bargaining can be time wasting.
Negative effects of practices
The insanitary conditions could cause a general epidemic that could spread to households that shop for food from this market. It is for fear of a situation such as this that the market was closed down not too long ago for renovations but this has not changed the conditions.
The contamination of food with bacteria that multiplies quickly in the humid environment makes food poisoning a possibility and some of the vegetables lose their state of freshness and nutritive values as a result of the way they are handled. Dry powdered food such as konkonte and gari are left at the mercy of the dusty wind during the dry season is certainly not healthy.
Dr David Nortey , Head of the Korle Bu Polyclinic, who sees to patients from Agbogbloshie . The common ailments they present are water- borne diseases like cholera , diarrhoea and typhoid. Added to these are other diseases like worm infestations, tuberculosis and injuries as a result of fights.
He is not surprised about such cases which he attributes to the insanitary conditions in the area. So for those of us who relish buying from that market, we stand the risk of buying typhoid and cholera to our homes.
Dr Nortey explains that the overcrowded nature of the area which does not allow good ventilation accounts for the high prevalence of tuberculosis while the choked gutters and drains are a very conducive place for the breeding of malaria.
The cluttered stalls and lanes blocked within the market means that in the event of fire-out break there is no access for fire engines.
Challenges
The Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA) is facing huge challenges of administering the market. It is overwhelmed with ensuring sanitation in the area.
As Mrs Rosemond Okpoti -Israel, Head of the Market Unit of the AMA puts it , the AMA has sweepers but the heavy influx of people to and fro the market make their job insignificant.
They sweep everyday but people sell in the night even when the market has officially closed so by day break the whole place is littered with discarded food stuff, sachet water and polythene bags.
The Ministry of Health has a unit at the market that sees to maintaining hygiene in the market. But the staff of this unit work from 8a.m to 5p.m.This means that the number of people who sleep in the market cannot be checked on .
Acts that offend the AMA’s (Public Markets) Bye Laws range from littering to selling or purchasing goods or stock near established markets other than approved places or erecting stalls at places other than the established markets . Offenders are liable on conviction.
The laws also require “all AMA tenants at the market to insure their properties against fire , theft, burglary or other foreseeable contingencies” and No occupier of any store in the market shall sublet or share such store, except with the written consent of the Assembly.
These bye -laws that regulate the market can be found in the Local Government Bulletin of September 1, 1995. Section 79 which is the Public markets bye- laws states that “ a district assembly shall make bye laws for the purpose of any function conferred upon it. The bye- laws specify as penalty, a fine not exceeding GH¢20 or a term of imprisonment not exceeding six months or both. It further specifies a penalty not exceeding 20Gp for each day on which the offence is continued after written notice of the conviction has been served on the offender in the case of a continuing offence.
Fine laws but are they being respected?
The city guards of the AMA work from 6a.m. to 6p.m. During this period , they are able to check users of the market. According to Mrs Okpoti-Israel, they have been taking people to court for breaking sanitation laws for instance but after 6p.m. When they close, the laws are flouted.
In spite of these negative practices and the potential health implications, Agbogbloshie remains relevant in the life of most households in Accra. It is from here that the smaller markets get their supplies for retailing and prices are considered moderate . Also worrisome is the fact that the insanitary conditions in this market is similar to what pertains in almost all markets I have visited in the country.
Suggestions for improving the market
It is for these reasons that efforts must be made to improve conditions in the market. The AMA needs to intensify its educational campaign on the need for maintaining hygiene at the markets and there is also the need to introduce modernity into the operations of the market women. The market queens could be used as change agents to ensure a change in attitude .
There should be regular visits by food inspectors; displaying of items such as oranges, plantains etc. on the bare floor should be prohibited and customers s are advised to wash such items before they even peel them. There should be no compromise; unauthorised structures that have been added to the stalls should be demolished to make way for easy movement within the market. The Ghana Standards Board has a role to play by introducing to the women advantages of weights and measures.
If Agbogbloshie market should remain where we get our food supplies, then sanitary conditions there should be ensured. That will be no luxury because it is our health that is at stake.
Tuesday, September 1, 2009
NCCE assesses performance of Parliament
Story: Doreen Allotey
THE National Commission for Civic Education (NCCE) is conducting a research to assess the performance of the Fourth Parliament of the Fourth Republic.
The study is aimed at finding out the extent to which Members of Parliament (MPs) are performing their constitutional roles and to what extent they have been meeting the expectations of the people they represent in Parliament.
The results of the study, which will cost the commission GH¢19,000, is expected to be ready by the end of September, this year.
In an interview in Accra yesterday, the Director of Research of the NCCE, Mrs Gertrude Zakaria Ali, said that 24 people from 60 out of the 230 constituencies will answer questionnaires for the survey and 100 parliamentarians of that Parliament will be interviewed.
She said the main objective was to improve upon democratic governance in the country by “getting feedback from the people in whom the sovereignty of the state resides but which they have ceded to the MPs as their representatives”.
Mrs Zakaria Ali said it was the second time that the study was being conducted. The first was conducted in 2000, when the performance of the Second Parliament of the Fourth Republic was assessed.
That study found, among other things, that the majority of the people were not interacting with their MPs and that some of them did not even know who their MPs were.
It also found out that the relationship between MPs and District Chief Executives was not very good and that the participation of MPs in district assemblies was not encouraging.
The study noted that the reason for those lapses was partly attributed to the fact that unit committees were not in place in many constituencies.
Those interviewed also stressed the need for MPs to have research assistants to improve interaction between them and the people they represented in Parliament.
The Deputy Chairman in charge of Programmes of the NCCE, Mr Baron Amoafo, stated that 60 civic education staff members of the commission were trained to administer the questionnaires.
He said it was necessary to train the staff to ensure that the quality of the primary data collected from the field was reliable.
Mr Amoafo said the study would also provide the platform for constituents and Members of Parliament to improve upon governance in the constituencies and the nation as a whole.
THE National Commission for Civic Education (NCCE) is conducting a research to assess the performance of the Fourth Parliament of the Fourth Republic.
The study is aimed at finding out the extent to which Members of Parliament (MPs) are performing their constitutional roles and to what extent they have been meeting the expectations of the people they represent in Parliament.
The results of the study, which will cost the commission GH¢19,000, is expected to be ready by the end of September, this year.
In an interview in Accra yesterday, the Director of Research of the NCCE, Mrs Gertrude Zakaria Ali, said that 24 people from 60 out of the 230 constituencies will answer questionnaires for the survey and 100 parliamentarians of that Parliament will be interviewed.
She said the main objective was to improve upon democratic governance in the country by “getting feedback from the people in whom the sovereignty of the state resides but which they have ceded to the MPs as their representatives”.
Mrs Zakaria Ali said it was the second time that the study was being conducted. The first was conducted in 2000, when the performance of the Second Parliament of the Fourth Republic was assessed.
That study found, among other things, that the majority of the people were not interacting with their MPs and that some of them did not even know who their MPs were.
It also found out that the relationship between MPs and District Chief Executives was not very good and that the participation of MPs in district assemblies was not encouraging.
The study noted that the reason for those lapses was partly attributed to the fact that unit committees were not in place in many constituencies.
Those interviewed also stressed the need for MPs to have research assistants to improve interaction between them and the people they represented in Parliament.
The Deputy Chairman in charge of Programmes of the NCCE, Mr Baron Amoafo, stated that 60 civic education staff members of the commission were trained to administer the questionnaires.
He said it was necessary to train the staff to ensure that the quality of the primary data collected from the field was reliable.
Mr Amoafo said the study would also provide the platform for constituents and Members of Parliament to improve upon governance in the constituencies and the nation as a whole.
The Internet- to use or not to use?
By Doreen Allotey
In recent times, concerns have been raised about the negative impact of the Internet on our youth. This has been occasioned by the upsurge of cyber fraud and its associated links with occultism, known in local parlance as Sakawa. Clearly, the issue of Internet fraud is neither peculiar to Ghana nor is it a new phenomenon. Internet fraud is perhaps as old as the Internet itself and obviously more pronounced in societies where Internet penetration is higher than what pertains in our part of the world.
What is disturbing and therefore requires some reflection is the fact that the problem is quite new in our country, the realisation that it is the youth who seem involved and most importantly, its alleged links to occultism.
Stories are told of how some boys and girls go through gruesome rituals, ranging from passing the night in cemeteries, sleeping in coffins, drinking human blood, not taking their bath and skipping sleep at night, as part of the rituals associated with the practice. Their motivation? To get rich quick!
Some newspaper reports claim that school attendance in certain areas have suffered as boys and girls troop to cybercafés, ostensibly to try their luck to become rich overnight. Needless to emphasise, the effect of such activity on education is obvious. Any society which sits unconcerned while its future leaders dabble in such dangerous activities must be courting trouble for itself. It is for these reasons that attempts by political leadership, as well as responsible individuals and institutions, to nip this embarrassing and dangerous practice in the bud must be encouraged.
Yet, in doing this, it is important that we draw a clear line between the irresponsible and negative use of the Internet and its potential to facilitate our individual and collective development as Ghanaians.
The Internet is like a double-edged sword. It has been proven in almost all ICT-driven societies that when well used, the Internet can accelerate national development. It is also a fact that it could derail our development aspirations. A typical case in point is the Sakawa menace we are presently grappling with.
For instance, the impact of the Internet on young minds, especially children, can be counter-productive if not well monitored. Some of its potentially negative effects could involve the amount of time child users devote to it at the expense of their academic work. Again, browsing the net entails some cost and in our part of the world, where cost of accessing the net is high and most family incomes are low, this could put undue stress on already financially-challenged families.
Also, the Internet provides a lot of information which may not be suitable for the consumption of young people. In this regard what readily comes to mind include pornographic sites, as well as others where some religious or ideological doctrines could be accessed. Indeed, evidence abounds to suggest that the Internet has been used and continues to be used to facilitate terrorist activities— as a medium for recruiting potential terrorists as well as for the propagation of terrorist/negative messages, for instance.
It should also be borne in mind that children could become addicted to browsing the net after protracted use, at the expense of their normal educational and recreational activities. Once they get hooked, they will rather sit behind the net than read their books or play hop-scotch or fly a kite! Related to this, medical research findings have identified excessive use of the Internet as one of the leading causes of child obesity and its attendant health problems.
Not withstanding the above, the Internet offers several positives for our society.
For instance, the Internet holds the largest amount of information “under one roof”. For students and other knowledge seekers, it offers an invaluable source of information and knowledge. This should be welcome news, especially in our case where library facilities are inadequate. And most of the material in our libraires is dated. Some of the problems with some information on the Internet has to do with the credibility of sources.
Through the Internet people, who, due to the exigencies of work, could not have pursued further education, are now acquiring knowledge and certificates through distance education. The Open University concept, virtual offices, electronic library and others owe their existence to ICT in general and the Internet in particular. The Internet is also making it possible for professionals to trade ideas with their colleagues in far away places. For instance, lawyers, architects, doctors and bankers can all share and exchange professional knowledge with their peers via the net.
E-commerce, which makes it possible for parties to transact businesses irrespective of geographic distances, is a brainchild of the Internet. Not only has e-commerce cut down on the cost and time of transacting business but has also increased the volume of international trade to an all-time high. Today, thanks to the Internet, it is possible to sit in Ghana and buy a car from Japan and get it delivered to you at a destination of your choice.
Also, the Internet remains a key medium in facilitating globalisation, global harmony and peace, as through it, people from diverse backgrounds and in different geographical locations can interact and get to know and appreciate each other’s culture better. The Internet has the ability to carry us far into some foreign land providing us with pictures and information about that land and its people. Related to this, is its huge potential as an advertising tool.
Its socialisation potential is evidenced by the large number of people who log on to chat rooms on a daily basis. In some cases, individuals have not only found friends but life partners.
It is in the light of the above that any attempt to demonise the Internet and discourage its use would be most disingenuous and unfortunate on our part. In fact, such an attempt will only be akin to throwing away the proverbial baby with the bathtub.
First , it is crucial that we identify Sakawa as essentially a socio-economic problem and a collective failure on our part as parents, rather than a technological one. There is the urgent need to step up parental/adult supervision and possibly also devise some workable regulation to sanitise the use of the Internet.
For without any shred of doubt, the Internet remains one of mankind’s best inventions in recent decades and has definitely come to stay. We, as a people, therefore, have to sensibly tap into it for our individual and collective development. Clearly, we have no other choice.
In recent times, concerns have been raised about the negative impact of the Internet on our youth. This has been occasioned by the upsurge of cyber fraud and its associated links with occultism, known in local parlance as Sakawa. Clearly, the issue of Internet fraud is neither peculiar to Ghana nor is it a new phenomenon. Internet fraud is perhaps as old as the Internet itself and obviously more pronounced in societies where Internet penetration is higher than what pertains in our part of the world.
What is disturbing and therefore requires some reflection is the fact that the problem is quite new in our country, the realisation that it is the youth who seem involved and most importantly, its alleged links to occultism.
Stories are told of how some boys and girls go through gruesome rituals, ranging from passing the night in cemeteries, sleeping in coffins, drinking human blood, not taking their bath and skipping sleep at night, as part of the rituals associated with the practice. Their motivation? To get rich quick!
Some newspaper reports claim that school attendance in certain areas have suffered as boys and girls troop to cybercafés, ostensibly to try their luck to become rich overnight. Needless to emphasise, the effect of such activity on education is obvious. Any society which sits unconcerned while its future leaders dabble in such dangerous activities must be courting trouble for itself. It is for these reasons that attempts by political leadership, as well as responsible individuals and institutions, to nip this embarrassing and dangerous practice in the bud must be encouraged.
Yet, in doing this, it is important that we draw a clear line between the irresponsible and negative use of the Internet and its potential to facilitate our individual and collective development as Ghanaians.
The Internet is like a double-edged sword. It has been proven in almost all ICT-driven societies that when well used, the Internet can accelerate national development. It is also a fact that it could derail our development aspirations. A typical case in point is the Sakawa menace we are presently grappling with.
For instance, the impact of the Internet on young minds, especially children, can be counter-productive if not well monitored. Some of its potentially negative effects could involve the amount of time child users devote to it at the expense of their academic work. Again, browsing the net entails some cost and in our part of the world, where cost of accessing the net is high and most family incomes are low, this could put undue stress on already financially-challenged families.
Also, the Internet provides a lot of information which may not be suitable for the consumption of young people. In this regard what readily comes to mind include pornographic sites, as well as others where some religious or ideological doctrines could be accessed. Indeed, evidence abounds to suggest that the Internet has been used and continues to be used to facilitate terrorist activities— as a medium for recruiting potential terrorists as well as for the propagation of terrorist/negative messages, for instance.
It should also be borne in mind that children could become addicted to browsing the net after protracted use, at the expense of their normal educational and recreational activities. Once they get hooked, they will rather sit behind the net than read their books or play hop-scotch or fly a kite! Related to this, medical research findings have identified excessive use of the Internet as one of the leading causes of child obesity and its attendant health problems.
Not withstanding the above, the Internet offers several positives for our society.
For instance, the Internet holds the largest amount of information “under one roof”. For students and other knowledge seekers, it offers an invaluable source of information and knowledge. This should be welcome news, especially in our case where library facilities are inadequate. And most of the material in our libraires is dated. Some of the problems with some information on the Internet has to do with the credibility of sources.
Through the Internet people, who, due to the exigencies of work, could not have pursued further education, are now acquiring knowledge and certificates through distance education. The Open University concept, virtual offices, electronic library and others owe their existence to ICT in general and the Internet in particular. The Internet is also making it possible for professionals to trade ideas with their colleagues in far away places. For instance, lawyers, architects, doctors and bankers can all share and exchange professional knowledge with their peers via the net.
E-commerce, which makes it possible for parties to transact businesses irrespective of geographic distances, is a brainchild of the Internet. Not only has e-commerce cut down on the cost and time of transacting business but has also increased the volume of international trade to an all-time high. Today, thanks to the Internet, it is possible to sit in Ghana and buy a car from Japan and get it delivered to you at a destination of your choice.
Also, the Internet remains a key medium in facilitating globalisation, global harmony and peace, as through it, people from diverse backgrounds and in different geographical locations can interact and get to know and appreciate each other’s culture better. The Internet has the ability to carry us far into some foreign land providing us with pictures and information about that land and its people. Related to this, is its huge potential as an advertising tool.
Its socialisation potential is evidenced by the large number of people who log on to chat rooms on a daily basis. In some cases, individuals have not only found friends but life partners.
It is in the light of the above that any attempt to demonise the Internet and discourage its use would be most disingenuous and unfortunate on our part. In fact, such an attempt will only be akin to throwing away the proverbial baby with the bathtub.
First , it is crucial that we identify Sakawa as essentially a socio-economic problem and a collective failure on our part as parents, rather than a technological one. There is the urgent need to step up parental/adult supervision and possibly also devise some workable regulation to sanitise the use of the Internet.
For without any shred of doubt, the Internet remains one of mankind’s best inventions in recent decades and has definitely come to stay. We, as a people, therefore, have to sensibly tap into it for our individual and collective development. Clearly, we have no other choice.
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
Obama: Mothers’ dream, children’s icon
By Doreen Allotey
July 10-11, 2009, will go down in Ghanaian history as memorable when Ghana hosts the 44th President of the United States of America. The visit of Barack Hussein Obama, to our relatively tiny country located on the west coast of Africa will last for only a scant 48 hours but the excitement and expectations it has generated are very high.
We can see such high fever in the preparation to receive our visitor and this is appropriately termed “Obamamania.” This simply shows the measure of the man, the first black person to be elected President of the United States of America, the most powerful nation in the world.
It is a great pity that apart from what we see of him on the television screen, many Ghanaians will not have the opportunity to meet him face to face, wave at him or have the fortune of shaking hands with him. The visit will be restricted to only Accra and Cape Coast and he is to commute between the two cities by helicopter. Not many residents of even Accra will line up the ceremonial routes to cheer him. Cape Coasters may be luckier if the rain-saturated clouds permit it. We urge them to give it all to “Uncle Obama” to their fullest capacity for their known hospitality and humour.
The full impact of the visit will not be felt only during the few hours that he will spend with us. Rather, the goodwill and the recognition he brings to the people of this country — and not some other country — on his first visit to sub-Saharan Africa will give Ghana such an image boost that will last long to come.
We should not reduce this visit to a flying holiday, we should remind ourselves that the US President is expected to make an important policy pronouncement affecting the whole of Africa. It is the initiatives and programmes contained in this statement that must produce the greatest impact of the visit. Mothers and children of this continent who regard Obama as “blood of our blood, flesh of our flesh” are hopeful that it will all be good news.
Before Obama makes the anticipated speech, let us do some thinking aloud: What are the expectations of Ghanaians for the visit of this man who has chosen Ghana first ? America has done great economic things for this country in terms of aid for infrastructural development. Roads, agricultural research, training and extension services; healthcare and education, have been undertaken with US aid. Mothers who run most of our informal economy as market women appreciate good roads. As farmers, women are ever grateful for good crop yields made possible by donor money. Mothers appreciate use of the malarial fund that provides mosquito nets and the chemicals to spray stagnant waters so that the scourge of malaria is minimised. Our children also benefit from donations of materials and buildings for our schools.
Our needs are endless and as government alone cannot satisfy them all, donor assistance will always be solicited. There is a saying that, “if you want to talk to God, you must talk into the air.” It is hoped that the Obama visit will bring in its wake initiatives to strengthen US assistance already on the ground and to initiate new ones. If our august visitors have the opportunity to visit any of our hospitals and schools, they will see some of the challenges facing this country.
Quite apart from donor assistance, the Ghanaian economy requires considerable American capital to develop our oil fields and assist in the development of a promising petrochemical industry to provide jobs, uplift the living standards of our people, and generate good returns for the investors. That we are a peace-loving nation is attested to by many nations, including the US. To a very large extent, Ghana is a safer investment proposition than most of the turbulent oil-producing countries where democratic governance is poor.
Ghanaians want to have the opportunity to go to schools in America and also pursue business interests there. But recent visa restrictions by the US Government have made this dream unattainable. It is pathetic to see the intimidating queues that form daily at the gates of the visa section of the US Embassy. Sometimes as early as 4 a.m.! The chances are that not even one per cent of the applicants are granted the travel documents. America is an open society, and in this era of globalisation severe travel restrictions to that country should be a thing of the past. Ghanaians currently living in the US pose no security risks. With that record, Ghanaians should not be encountering travel difficulties to the US. This is a plea from mothers and children to the US President.
To any mother, Barack Obama is a dream son; to any child, a perfect icon and across all demographic groups of the world, a hero and a colossus as his stature spans the whole globe. A mother whose womb is gifted with such a child has indeed been pre-ordained. She is special and should rightly be envied by other women of more endowed circumstances. All the mother’s toils of mothering and the devotion of the grandparents who assisted in bringing this special child up have been amply rewarded. They did not pamper and render him a spoilt child, but they instilled in him the spirit of hard work, dedication and devotion to his nation.
Long after Obama is gone from our shores, the name will remain in many households where Ghanaian mothers, always looking for an icon (because there is always something in a great name), will surely have named some of their male babies after him. I have even seen a hotel in Legon called Obama Hotel! Long after the commemoration cloths and the other memorabilia have faded, the name will still ring. Those who bear the Obama name will know the full life history of the man who was not born with a silver spoon in his mouth. His story will encourage them to attempt heights attained by their icon.
His wife Michelle is to be enstooled a queen at Cape Coast. This is an investiture with profound significance in the Ghanaian culture and it is hoped that traditionalists will educate her on this ceremony. What can be said here is that she will be inducted into a clan with a totem with a rich cultural meaning. The queen is required to advise the chief on weighty traditional and developmental issues. No clan wants an absentee queen. The implications for Michelle to visit her people very regularly cannot be over-emphasised. “Come back soon” is the clarion call. With her induction, the children, Melissa and Natasha get inducted automatically as princesses. They will also have the responsibility of being role models and future leaders as well.
Ghanaian mothers and children are proud of the Obama family.
July 10-11, 2009, will go down in Ghanaian history as memorable when Ghana hosts the 44th President of the United States of America. The visit of Barack Hussein Obama, to our relatively tiny country located on the west coast of Africa will last for only a scant 48 hours but the excitement and expectations it has generated are very high.
We can see such high fever in the preparation to receive our visitor and this is appropriately termed “Obamamania.” This simply shows the measure of the man, the first black person to be elected President of the United States of America, the most powerful nation in the world.
It is a great pity that apart from what we see of him on the television screen, many Ghanaians will not have the opportunity to meet him face to face, wave at him or have the fortune of shaking hands with him. The visit will be restricted to only Accra and Cape Coast and he is to commute between the two cities by helicopter. Not many residents of even Accra will line up the ceremonial routes to cheer him. Cape Coasters may be luckier if the rain-saturated clouds permit it. We urge them to give it all to “Uncle Obama” to their fullest capacity for their known hospitality and humour.
The full impact of the visit will not be felt only during the few hours that he will spend with us. Rather, the goodwill and the recognition he brings to the people of this country — and not some other country — on his first visit to sub-Saharan Africa will give Ghana such an image boost that will last long to come.
We should not reduce this visit to a flying holiday, we should remind ourselves that the US President is expected to make an important policy pronouncement affecting the whole of Africa. It is the initiatives and programmes contained in this statement that must produce the greatest impact of the visit. Mothers and children of this continent who regard Obama as “blood of our blood, flesh of our flesh” are hopeful that it will all be good news.
Before Obama makes the anticipated speech, let us do some thinking aloud: What are the expectations of Ghanaians for the visit of this man who has chosen Ghana first ? America has done great economic things for this country in terms of aid for infrastructural development. Roads, agricultural research, training and extension services; healthcare and education, have been undertaken with US aid. Mothers who run most of our informal economy as market women appreciate good roads. As farmers, women are ever grateful for good crop yields made possible by donor money. Mothers appreciate use of the malarial fund that provides mosquito nets and the chemicals to spray stagnant waters so that the scourge of malaria is minimised. Our children also benefit from donations of materials and buildings for our schools.
Our needs are endless and as government alone cannot satisfy them all, donor assistance will always be solicited. There is a saying that, “if you want to talk to God, you must talk into the air.” It is hoped that the Obama visit will bring in its wake initiatives to strengthen US assistance already on the ground and to initiate new ones. If our august visitors have the opportunity to visit any of our hospitals and schools, they will see some of the challenges facing this country.
Quite apart from donor assistance, the Ghanaian economy requires considerable American capital to develop our oil fields and assist in the development of a promising petrochemical industry to provide jobs, uplift the living standards of our people, and generate good returns for the investors. That we are a peace-loving nation is attested to by many nations, including the US. To a very large extent, Ghana is a safer investment proposition than most of the turbulent oil-producing countries where democratic governance is poor.
Ghanaians want to have the opportunity to go to schools in America and also pursue business interests there. But recent visa restrictions by the US Government have made this dream unattainable. It is pathetic to see the intimidating queues that form daily at the gates of the visa section of the US Embassy. Sometimes as early as 4 a.m.! The chances are that not even one per cent of the applicants are granted the travel documents. America is an open society, and in this era of globalisation severe travel restrictions to that country should be a thing of the past. Ghanaians currently living in the US pose no security risks. With that record, Ghanaians should not be encountering travel difficulties to the US. This is a plea from mothers and children to the US President.
To any mother, Barack Obama is a dream son; to any child, a perfect icon and across all demographic groups of the world, a hero and a colossus as his stature spans the whole globe. A mother whose womb is gifted with such a child has indeed been pre-ordained. She is special and should rightly be envied by other women of more endowed circumstances. All the mother’s toils of mothering and the devotion of the grandparents who assisted in bringing this special child up have been amply rewarded. They did not pamper and render him a spoilt child, but they instilled in him the spirit of hard work, dedication and devotion to his nation.
Long after Obama is gone from our shores, the name will remain in many households where Ghanaian mothers, always looking for an icon (because there is always something in a great name), will surely have named some of their male babies after him. I have even seen a hotel in Legon called Obama Hotel! Long after the commemoration cloths and the other memorabilia have faded, the name will still ring. Those who bear the Obama name will know the full life history of the man who was not born with a silver spoon in his mouth. His story will encourage them to attempt heights attained by their icon.
His wife Michelle is to be enstooled a queen at Cape Coast. This is an investiture with profound significance in the Ghanaian culture and it is hoped that traditionalists will educate her on this ceremony. What can be said here is that she will be inducted into a clan with a totem with a rich cultural meaning. The queen is required to advise the chief on weighty traditional and developmental issues. No clan wants an absentee queen. The implications for Michelle to visit her people very regularly cannot be over-emphasised. “Come back soon” is the clarion call. With her induction, the children, Melissa and Natasha get inducted automatically as princesses. They will also have the responsibility of being role models and future leaders as well.
Ghanaian mothers and children are proud of the Obama family.
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
Challenges of a working mother
By Doreen Allotey
YOU seem to have the morning blues. You feel funny and secretly pray that it is for real. You confide in your husband that you are pregnant and he looks like someone with mixed feelings. First is that of surprise, giving credence to the fact that even though there is a scientific explanation for how a woman becomes pregnant, men recognise the power of the Supreme being in the process. Otherwise why the surprise?
Well, your husband is very happy that you are about to let the whole world know that he is a man, but deep down inside he thinks about the implications and consequences, such as the family budget and what is expected of him as a father.
He starts helping around the house, ostensibly to make the household chores lighter, and starts treating you like an egg.
Your visit to the doctor confirms that a new one is on the way and your excitement increases.
Your increase in size attracts attention and your colleagues at the workplace start teasing you.
Some call you double-decker, some ask you what you have been eating, while others just look at you and sigh, to show that they know what you have been up to.
With time your clothes do not fit any longer and you need to buy or make clothes that will give you and the growing one some space.
Pregnancy brings with it different kinds of moods. Sometimes you do not feel like talking at all — not because you are unfriendly but because if you do so your mouth fills up with saliva, a sight that nobody likes.
A simple comment innocently made can send you throwing tantrums. Your mood is at it, playing games with you. And oh, how some women take advantage of this to do and say things!
You may hate to see the very kind of food which used to be your favourite and crave for something that people around you find extremely odd. There have been real stories of women who have chewed chalk, white clay (ayilo) salt and cola nuts to satisfy these cravings, very much aware that they are not healthy.
Some husbands have experiences of travelling from, say, Tema to Dansoman in search of kelewele (spicy fried plantain) from a particular seller because that is what heavy wife is asking for. Without it, she may nag the whole night.
Every pregnancy seems unique in the sense of how it treats you. You may have nausea or morning sickness and lose appetite for one pregnancy, while another gives you an unbelievable appetite. You also find that you can neither lie on your back nor your belly. You are sentenced to lying only on your sides.
The early weeks of pregnancy do not get you attending antenatal clinics so regularly, but as time goes on and the due date draws nearer, the doctor requires you to visit more frequently.
You have the choice, during your scans, to find out the sex of the baby — male or female?
This is another exciting moment for you and your partner. Even though certain items may have been bought for baby already, the confirmation of sex enables you to buy according to some colour scheme. Most couples choose blue for boys and settle on pink for girls.
Luckily, ante-natal clinics provide a basic list of what a new born requires. This facilitates the preparation for the new one and a provisional shopping list.
As a working mother, you plan your leave in such a way that you spend most of it when the baby arrives instead of before. That puts some stress on you because the last days before it descends make walking uncomfortable. But you struggle through, going to work just to have time for the baby.
Even though you are given lessons on the signs to expect as an indication of labour and when you should start heading for the hospital to be delivered of your baby, you can be overtaken by events because you may not read the symptoms right. If you are lucky to have some experienced old lady with you, this will not be a problem. The experienced ones have eyes like X-rays; they look at you and can tell what is about to happen!
Whatever the case may be, the cramps are good enough to race you off towards the hospital. But that may only be the “comedies”. There is this story a midwife told of how one first-timer walked into the hospital and announced to the nurses at the table that she was in labour. They quickly showed her to her room, knowing very well that nothing had started. She took a fashion magazine, started reading it and touched up her make-up. When it was show time, the magazine went flying across the room, while she hang onto the curtain railings in the room like a bat. What a strategy to cope with pain! The room where she was reading had become too small to contain her.
Now the baby arrives and this opens another chapter of your life — the sleepless nights as baby cries for what you will believe as no apparent reason! You may never find out the cause of baby’s cries and will keep guessing all kinds of things in a bid to stop the crying.
Your husband comes to the rescue and you take turns to carry the baby around, holding it over the shoulder and patting it on the back. Sometimes you are forced to march up and down the room like soldiers because any attempt to sit draws cries from the baby.
By morning the two of you are as tired as hunters from a night’s expedition. But the morning is when well wishers, friends and family members come in to visit and congratulate you! Mother will still have to see them, with bleary eyes and a smile, of course.
It seems it takes a while for new borns to get used to their new environment outside the womb.
In no time your maternity leave comes to an end and you have to resume work. This can be quite stressful for the working nursing mother. With no alternative of a relation to take care of the baby at home, you decide to send it over to a crèche, you look out for one that is neat and where the baby can have the best of attention. But you can never really tell what happens to it in your absence, for even if it has been crying the whole day and refused to eat, he will be cleaned up and powdered up by the time you arrive to pick him.
Leaving the baby at the crèche on the first day is traumatic. You get to the crèche and the baby is received warmly, but turning to walk away towards work becomes a big emotional problem, especially if you are breastfeeding. You find tears rolling down your cheeks while the baby also cries for you!
At work, you have divided attention. In fact, you hear the baby crying sometimes and if someone inadvertently touches your filled-up breasts, your dress gets soaked with milk!
Luckily, the laws of the land allow you to leave earlier than your colleagues. As punctual as you used to be to work on a daily basis, you realise that you sometimes just cannot get it right any longer. There are times when you wake up early to get yourself and the baby ready and are about to go out the door only to find that it just made another parcel in its diapers. You have little choice but to change the diapers and that takes some time.
In such a situation, make your presence felt at work by working extra hard to compensate for your lateness and do not make it a usual excuse at all.
As a working nursing mother, you find that your time is not yours any longer.
You would prefer getting some sleep at the least opportunity to sitting at your favourite spot listening to live band music!
Your responsibilities as a wife will also take a toll on you — taking care of the baby, cleaning the house, washing, cooking and keeping yourself intact for your husband.
In spite of all these challenges, do not be too surprised if you find, in less than two years, that number two is on the way. Why should you be surprised if you have not visited the family planning clinic? That old lady’s tale of breastfeeding being a contraceptive is not true.
So you start another cycle, but obviously you now have loads of experience and will, therefore, be able to cope better with the challenges. But as the number of births increases, so do the challenges.
One interesting thing is that every child has its own peculiarities. Some babies treat you kinder than others. While one would wail just because of a wet nappy, another will even sleep in his soiled nappy. Some babies want company all the time and refuse to lie in the cot except between you and daddy! Others can sit quietly for long hours while you do your household chores. Their character naturally produces for them pet names that you keep and treasure even when they have become men.
It is a great joy to watch babies grow. But with their growth comes a whole set of challenges — picking them up from school, moulding their character, the anxiety about making them responsible in future and helping with homework. Depending on your finances, you could employ a teacher to lend a hand.
There are times when the working mother has to travel because work demands that she does. She is very ready to respond to this duty but very worried about what happens to the home in her absence.
The working mother faces a stiffer challenge when she attempts to improve her curriculum vitae through further education. The decision to go back to school is a tough one for her knowing very well that what she is about to put her self through would increase her responsibilities. She is about to combine her assignments in school with helping her children with their home work and a lot more. Her responsibilities at home don’t change at all. Once again she is prepared to juggle, knowing very well that it is a temporary challenge that will make her a better person for the benefit of her family. She sometimes has to run from the lecture hall to pick her children at school. She continues with lectures while the children wait in the car or somewhere more comfortable and they drive home after the lectures.
At home, there is no time for rest, as her husband is waiting for his food.
Balancing your responsibilities at work, at home and to your husband and children as a working mother remains a challenge that one should plan and manage. You learn to juggle on the job.
After all is said and done, a real mother stands up to these challenges as they come, remains prayerful and does not give up her children for anything else in the world!
YOU seem to have the morning blues. You feel funny and secretly pray that it is for real. You confide in your husband that you are pregnant and he looks like someone with mixed feelings. First is that of surprise, giving credence to the fact that even though there is a scientific explanation for how a woman becomes pregnant, men recognise the power of the Supreme being in the process. Otherwise why the surprise?
Well, your husband is very happy that you are about to let the whole world know that he is a man, but deep down inside he thinks about the implications and consequences, such as the family budget and what is expected of him as a father.
He starts helping around the house, ostensibly to make the household chores lighter, and starts treating you like an egg.
Your visit to the doctor confirms that a new one is on the way and your excitement increases.
Your increase in size attracts attention and your colleagues at the workplace start teasing you.
Some call you double-decker, some ask you what you have been eating, while others just look at you and sigh, to show that they know what you have been up to.
With time your clothes do not fit any longer and you need to buy or make clothes that will give you and the growing one some space.
Pregnancy brings with it different kinds of moods. Sometimes you do not feel like talking at all — not because you are unfriendly but because if you do so your mouth fills up with saliva, a sight that nobody likes.
A simple comment innocently made can send you throwing tantrums. Your mood is at it, playing games with you. And oh, how some women take advantage of this to do and say things!
You may hate to see the very kind of food which used to be your favourite and crave for something that people around you find extremely odd. There have been real stories of women who have chewed chalk, white clay (ayilo) salt and cola nuts to satisfy these cravings, very much aware that they are not healthy.
Some husbands have experiences of travelling from, say, Tema to Dansoman in search of kelewele (spicy fried plantain) from a particular seller because that is what heavy wife is asking for. Without it, she may nag the whole night.
Every pregnancy seems unique in the sense of how it treats you. You may have nausea or morning sickness and lose appetite for one pregnancy, while another gives you an unbelievable appetite. You also find that you can neither lie on your back nor your belly. You are sentenced to lying only on your sides.
The early weeks of pregnancy do not get you attending antenatal clinics so regularly, but as time goes on and the due date draws nearer, the doctor requires you to visit more frequently.
You have the choice, during your scans, to find out the sex of the baby — male or female?
This is another exciting moment for you and your partner. Even though certain items may have been bought for baby already, the confirmation of sex enables you to buy according to some colour scheme. Most couples choose blue for boys and settle on pink for girls.
Luckily, ante-natal clinics provide a basic list of what a new born requires. This facilitates the preparation for the new one and a provisional shopping list.
As a working mother, you plan your leave in such a way that you spend most of it when the baby arrives instead of before. That puts some stress on you because the last days before it descends make walking uncomfortable. But you struggle through, going to work just to have time for the baby.
Even though you are given lessons on the signs to expect as an indication of labour and when you should start heading for the hospital to be delivered of your baby, you can be overtaken by events because you may not read the symptoms right. If you are lucky to have some experienced old lady with you, this will not be a problem. The experienced ones have eyes like X-rays; they look at you and can tell what is about to happen!
Whatever the case may be, the cramps are good enough to race you off towards the hospital. But that may only be the “comedies”. There is this story a midwife told of how one first-timer walked into the hospital and announced to the nurses at the table that she was in labour. They quickly showed her to her room, knowing very well that nothing had started. She took a fashion magazine, started reading it and touched up her make-up. When it was show time, the magazine went flying across the room, while she hang onto the curtain railings in the room like a bat. What a strategy to cope with pain! The room where she was reading had become too small to contain her.
Now the baby arrives and this opens another chapter of your life — the sleepless nights as baby cries for what you will believe as no apparent reason! You may never find out the cause of baby’s cries and will keep guessing all kinds of things in a bid to stop the crying.
Your husband comes to the rescue and you take turns to carry the baby around, holding it over the shoulder and patting it on the back. Sometimes you are forced to march up and down the room like soldiers because any attempt to sit draws cries from the baby.
By morning the two of you are as tired as hunters from a night’s expedition. But the morning is when well wishers, friends and family members come in to visit and congratulate you! Mother will still have to see them, with bleary eyes and a smile, of course.
It seems it takes a while for new borns to get used to their new environment outside the womb.
In no time your maternity leave comes to an end and you have to resume work. This can be quite stressful for the working nursing mother. With no alternative of a relation to take care of the baby at home, you decide to send it over to a crèche, you look out for one that is neat and where the baby can have the best of attention. But you can never really tell what happens to it in your absence, for even if it has been crying the whole day and refused to eat, he will be cleaned up and powdered up by the time you arrive to pick him.
Leaving the baby at the crèche on the first day is traumatic. You get to the crèche and the baby is received warmly, but turning to walk away towards work becomes a big emotional problem, especially if you are breastfeeding. You find tears rolling down your cheeks while the baby also cries for you!
At work, you have divided attention. In fact, you hear the baby crying sometimes and if someone inadvertently touches your filled-up breasts, your dress gets soaked with milk!
Luckily, the laws of the land allow you to leave earlier than your colleagues. As punctual as you used to be to work on a daily basis, you realise that you sometimes just cannot get it right any longer. There are times when you wake up early to get yourself and the baby ready and are about to go out the door only to find that it just made another parcel in its diapers. You have little choice but to change the diapers and that takes some time.
In such a situation, make your presence felt at work by working extra hard to compensate for your lateness and do not make it a usual excuse at all.
As a working nursing mother, you find that your time is not yours any longer.
You would prefer getting some sleep at the least opportunity to sitting at your favourite spot listening to live band music!
Your responsibilities as a wife will also take a toll on you — taking care of the baby, cleaning the house, washing, cooking and keeping yourself intact for your husband.
In spite of all these challenges, do not be too surprised if you find, in less than two years, that number two is on the way. Why should you be surprised if you have not visited the family planning clinic? That old lady’s tale of breastfeeding being a contraceptive is not true.
So you start another cycle, but obviously you now have loads of experience and will, therefore, be able to cope better with the challenges. But as the number of births increases, so do the challenges.
One interesting thing is that every child has its own peculiarities. Some babies treat you kinder than others. While one would wail just because of a wet nappy, another will even sleep in his soiled nappy. Some babies want company all the time and refuse to lie in the cot except between you and daddy! Others can sit quietly for long hours while you do your household chores. Their character naturally produces for them pet names that you keep and treasure even when they have become men.
It is a great joy to watch babies grow. But with their growth comes a whole set of challenges — picking them up from school, moulding their character, the anxiety about making them responsible in future and helping with homework. Depending on your finances, you could employ a teacher to lend a hand.
There are times when the working mother has to travel because work demands that she does. She is very ready to respond to this duty but very worried about what happens to the home in her absence.
The working mother faces a stiffer challenge when she attempts to improve her curriculum vitae through further education. The decision to go back to school is a tough one for her knowing very well that what she is about to put her self through would increase her responsibilities. She is about to combine her assignments in school with helping her children with their home work and a lot more. Her responsibilities at home don’t change at all. Once again she is prepared to juggle, knowing very well that it is a temporary challenge that will make her a better person for the benefit of her family. She sometimes has to run from the lecture hall to pick her children at school. She continues with lectures while the children wait in the car or somewhere more comfortable and they drive home after the lectures.
At home, there is no time for rest, as her husband is waiting for his food.
Balancing your responsibilities at work, at home and to your husband and children as a working mother remains a challenge that one should plan and manage. You learn to juggle on the job.
After all is said and done, a real mother stands up to these challenges as they come, remains prayerful and does not give up her children for anything else in the world!
Has the new been better than the old?
Asks Doreen Allotey
FROM the songs of old, we get the idea of what things used to be. The song, Serwaa Akoto, paints the picture of a lady with remarkable beauty who would not raise her voice in public, how much more wash her dirty linen there. She is a symbol of what society expected the ideal woman to be at that time. The call for affirmative action, gender equality and mainstreaming were obviously not so dominant at that time.
From A. B. Crentsil’s song, Juliana, we get the idea of how men used to woo ladies. The approach was not so direct. They could call the lady they wanted, and try to strike acquaintance by mistaking their semblance for that of their sister and then go on to admire their beauty all the same. What the response to that formula used to be was: “I will think about it”. Now it is more direct. “I love you.” Just like that, in the face. No beating about the bush and gradually women are getting bolder and assertive enough to see men and go after them.
Before this phenomenon, we even had arranged marriages where a family decided for a girl, who her husband was to be, did an introduction and then married them off. Sometimes the marriage was aimed at creating a stronger bond between both families for historical reasons, other times it was for the economic reason of keeping the family wealth within the family. In this case, we could have cousins getting married etc. etc. This is not common anymore.
The classic movie, I told you so is a great one. This film is normally shown on Independence Day. Apart from making meaning of the saying: All that glitters is not gold, we get the opportunity to see the fashion of those times, different kinds of wigs, kerb and slit , ear rings etc. Interestingly, some of them are very much in vogue today. Fashion just revolves and comes back with little variations. Still it will be very surprising if the hair style “Shark “ and “Bushy” or “Afro”, make a strong come back even though we spot them among the very common low haircuts or “Sweat” which have dominated the scene for quite a long time now.
The movies of old show how man’s greatest companion today— the telephone — without which life would be nightmarish for many, has evolved. From 1876 when it was invented in Boston by Alexander Graham Bell, the telephone has gone through several transformations with the aim of making it more portable and stylish with a clearer sound quality. At a point in its evolution, people had to wind the phones like is done to the corn mill machine, all that effort to make a call at a stipulated time, and the ringing tone was deafening. Now there are all kinds of ringing tones especially for cell phones with some sounding like a whole orchestra while others mimic the sounds of animals, wow, meow and moo. Interestingly, these sounds now seem so irritating to some matured ears that they prefer to keep the cell phone permanently on silent with only the vibration on to alert them or a beep. Others have gone back from the different high tech sounds of night club music to the grriiiiiiing griiiiiiiing reminiscent of Charlie Chaplain days.
The refrigerator also arrived to gradually displace the cooler which was made of clay. Mechanical refrigeration became widespread during the 1920s but obviously much later in Ghana. Water from the cooler was a delicacy; it was so nice because of the smoky flavour effected by placing the cooler over burning palm fruit husks before being filled with water.
There have also been changes in the way music is played. The first practical gramophone was invented in 1877 by the great American inventor, Thomas A. Edison. However, earlier that year, a Frenchman, Charles Cros, had drawn up a plan for a similar machine. Cros’s gramophone never advanced beyond the planning stage any way.
In modern times the Compact Disc (CD) has been the in thing; Sleek and portable than the record which was quite big and heavy too. For a while, CDs made records look very unwanted. Now there are homes with a thousand and one CDs which cannot be played because they are full of scratches and they just freeze during play. During the days of records, we could change the speed from 33 to 45 and 75 . We could lift the pin and move it to the song we wanted to play. And we could still pile up the records and watch them drop one after the other for continuous play. The audio cassette which is becoming extinct enabled us to turn front and back, side A and side B. We could rewind front and back on the cassette player or even twirl on our finger or a pen to forward or rewind. If there was some damage to a part, we could cut the damaged part and mend it with cellotape and then back to play.
Watching us go front and back through many transformations prompts the question: Has the new necessarily been better than the old?
FROM the songs of old, we get the idea of what things used to be. The song, Serwaa Akoto, paints the picture of a lady with remarkable beauty who would not raise her voice in public, how much more wash her dirty linen there. She is a symbol of what society expected the ideal woman to be at that time. The call for affirmative action, gender equality and mainstreaming were obviously not so dominant at that time.
From A. B. Crentsil’s song, Juliana, we get the idea of how men used to woo ladies. The approach was not so direct. They could call the lady they wanted, and try to strike acquaintance by mistaking their semblance for that of their sister and then go on to admire their beauty all the same. What the response to that formula used to be was: “I will think about it”. Now it is more direct. “I love you.” Just like that, in the face. No beating about the bush and gradually women are getting bolder and assertive enough to see men and go after them.
Before this phenomenon, we even had arranged marriages where a family decided for a girl, who her husband was to be, did an introduction and then married them off. Sometimes the marriage was aimed at creating a stronger bond between both families for historical reasons, other times it was for the economic reason of keeping the family wealth within the family. In this case, we could have cousins getting married etc. etc. This is not common anymore.
The classic movie, I told you so is a great one. This film is normally shown on Independence Day. Apart from making meaning of the saying: All that glitters is not gold, we get the opportunity to see the fashion of those times, different kinds of wigs, kerb and slit , ear rings etc. Interestingly, some of them are very much in vogue today. Fashion just revolves and comes back with little variations. Still it will be very surprising if the hair style “Shark “ and “Bushy” or “Afro”, make a strong come back even though we spot them among the very common low haircuts or “Sweat” which have dominated the scene for quite a long time now.
The movies of old show how man’s greatest companion today— the telephone — without which life would be nightmarish for many, has evolved. From 1876 when it was invented in Boston by Alexander Graham Bell, the telephone has gone through several transformations with the aim of making it more portable and stylish with a clearer sound quality. At a point in its evolution, people had to wind the phones like is done to the corn mill machine, all that effort to make a call at a stipulated time, and the ringing tone was deafening. Now there are all kinds of ringing tones especially for cell phones with some sounding like a whole orchestra while others mimic the sounds of animals, wow, meow and moo. Interestingly, these sounds now seem so irritating to some matured ears that they prefer to keep the cell phone permanently on silent with only the vibration on to alert them or a beep. Others have gone back from the different high tech sounds of night club music to the grriiiiiiing griiiiiiiing reminiscent of Charlie Chaplain days.
The refrigerator also arrived to gradually displace the cooler which was made of clay. Mechanical refrigeration became widespread during the 1920s but obviously much later in Ghana. Water from the cooler was a delicacy; it was so nice because of the smoky flavour effected by placing the cooler over burning palm fruit husks before being filled with water.
There have also been changes in the way music is played. The first practical gramophone was invented in 1877 by the great American inventor, Thomas A. Edison. However, earlier that year, a Frenchman, Charles Cros, had drawn up a plan for a similar machine. Cros’s gramophone never advanced beyond the planning stage any way.
In modern times the Compact Disc (CD) has been the in thing; Sleek and portable than the record which was quite big and heavy too. For a while, CDs made records look very unwanted. Now there are homes with a thousand and one CDs which cannot be played because they are full of scratches and they just freeze during play. During the days of records, we could change the speed from 33 to 45 and 75 . We could lift the pin and move it to the song we wanted to play. And we could still pile up the records and watch them drop one after the other for continuous play. The audio cassette which is becoming extinct enabled us to turn front and back, side A and side B. We could rewind front and back on the cassette player or even twirl on our finger or a pen to forward or rewind. If there was some damage to a part, we could cut the damaged part and mend it with cellotape and then back to play.
Watching us go front and back through many transformations prompts the question: Has the new necessarily been better than the old?
Wednesday, February 4, 2009
Skin to skin contact can cause cervical cancer
By Doreen Allotey
THE room where a group of media personnel had gathered became very silent as the resource person, Dr Lynda Decker of Franklyn Medical Services , gave some startling information about Cervical Cancer.
The media had been invited by the Pharmaceutical Society of Ghana and GlaxoSmithKline, a pharmaceutical company for the purpose of making as advocates. The two institutions wanted to give the media personnel information about the disease for them to educate the public .
The media learnt that “Just by shaking hands with a person carrying the Human Papilloma Virus (HPV) , a woman could finally get cervical cancer and die . The very name of the disease shows that only females can get it since they have cervixes and not males but the virus that causes the diseases can be transmitted by both males and females. The manner in which their bodies have been made for reproductive functions, women do facing many challenges and cervical cancer is one of them.
Dr Decker dwelt on “skin to skin contact” as one of the mode of transmission with a simple hand shake as an example . Eversince I have been very wary of those i shake hands with since I cannot tell by facial expression who may or may not be carrying the HPV . I wonder how long I can maintain this attitude in a society where refusal to shake hands could mean that all is not well with you and the one offering his or her hand.
The startling details given by Dr Decker that every sexually active woman is at a risk of cancer infection the HPV type throughout her lifetime and that it is estimated that up to 80 per cent of women will acquire a HPV infection by the age of 50, and up to 50 per cent of these infections will be from a virus type which has the potential to cause cervical cancer.
Dr Decker explained that cervical cancer occurred when abnormal cells on the cervix grew out of control.
“You get HPVnot only by having sex with someone who has it but by having skin to skin contact with the person” she said.
There are many types of the HPV virus but not all of them do cause cervical cancer. Some of them cause genital warts but other types may not produce any symptoms at all.
This means that one can have HPV for years and may not know it. It stays in your body and can lead to cervical cancer years after you have been infected.
There are factors that may play aid the growth of cervical cancer:
Smoking or history of smoking. As Dr Decker explained, smoking seems to make protract HPV infections .
A study shows that one’s risk of cervical cell changes may also increase if the person stays around someone who smokes.
Cervical cell changes are more likely vanish on their own in women who do not smoke.
Having an impaired immune system such as HIV and the use of birth control pills for more than five years also increases a person’s susceptibility.
Dr Decker said cervical cell changes in the cervix develops as a result of persistent infection from the HPV virus. The virus is extremely common and is easily transmitted from skin to skin especially the genital area. This means that the virus could be acquired without penetrative sex or full sexual intercourse and this also means that condoms may not do much by preventing women from acquiring the virus.
In a society where same sex is not strange, an infected female could pass the disease on to another female.
The sad part of the story is that abnormal cervical cell changes in the cervix rarely causes symptoms until it is getting late. The symptoms may only appear when the cell changes grow into cervical cancer.
These symptoms may include bleeding from the vagina which is not due to a change in menstrual cycle that can be explained, and bleeding when something comes into contact with the cervix such as sexual intercourse . Pain during sex and vaginal discharge tinged with blood are some of the symptoms of cervical cancer.
Fortunately there is a way of detecting the disease. This can be done by a test called the Pap Smear test. This means that the only way to prevent the disease from causing havoc is regular tests.
The Pap smear would 80 per cent of the time, show the cell changes before they turn into cancer so that if you have a problem early treatment could be done.
Since condoms are of little help when it comes to prevention of the disease, Dr Decker recommends abstinence or limiting the number of sex partners.
While Pap smear tests play a vital part by detecting the abnormal cells, the screening does not prevent infection of cancer-causing virus types. It is very helpful however because it is only when you have the disease that treatment can commence.
The treatment for cervical cancer includes cryotherapy , hysterectomy, cone biopsy, and laser treatment.
There is however hope for prevention — vaccination. There is a vaccine that may protect a woman against the disease in up to 70 per cent of cervical cancer cases.
According to Dr Decker, evidence from clinical trials had shown that vaccination alongside regular screening could reduce the chance of developing cervical cancer by 94 per cent, compared to no intervention.
Even though Dr Decker is preaching abstinence as a preventive method and the limitation of the number of sexual partners, regular screening seems to be a more helpful approach especially when a common handshake can also transmit the disease.
It is important for women to regularly go for pap tests and seek more information about the vaccine from their doctors in order to save their lives.
THE room where a group of media personnel had gathered became very silent as the resource person, Dr Lynda Decker of Franklyn Medical Services , gave some startling information about Cervical Cancer.
The media had been invited by the Pharmaceutical Society of Ghana and GlaxoSmithKline, a pharmaceutical company for the purpose of making as advocates. The two institutions wanted to give the media personnel information about the disease for them to educate the public .
The media learnt that “Just by shaking hands with a person carrying the Human Papilloma Virus (HPV) , a woman could finally get cervical cancer and die . The very name of the disease shows that only females can get it since they have cervixes and not males but the virus that causes the diseases can be transmitted by both males and females. The manner in which their bodies have been made for reproductive functions, women do facing many challenges and cervical cancer is one of them.
Dr Decker dwelt on “skin to skin contact” as one of the mode of transmission with a simple hand shake as an example . Eversince I have been very wary of those i shake hands with since I cannot tell by facial expression who may or may not be carrying the HPV . I wonder how long I can maintain this attitude in a society where refusal to shake hands could mean that all is not well with you and the one offering his or her hand.
The startling details given by Dr Decker that every sexually active woman is at a risk of cancer infection the HPV type throughout her lifetime and that it is estimated that up to 80 per cent of women will acquire a HPV infection by the age of 50, and up to 50 per cent of these infections will be from a virus type which has the potential to cause cervical cancer.
Dr Decker explained that cervical cancer occurred when abnormal cells on the cervix grew out of control.
“You get HPVnot only by having sex with someone who has it but by having skin to skin contact with the person” she said.
There are many types of the HPV virus but not all of them do cause cervical cancer. Some of them cause genital warts but other types may not produce any symptoms at all.
This means that one can have HPV for years and may not know it. It stays in your body and can lead to cervical cancer years after you have been infected.
There are factors that may play aid the growth of cervical cancer:
Smoking or history of smoking. As Dr Decker explained, smoking seems to make protract HPV infections .
A study shows that one’s risk of cervical cell changes may also increase if the person stays around someone who smokes.
Cervical cell changes are more likely vanish on their own in women who do not smoke.
Having an impaired immune system such as HIV and the use of birth control pills for more than five years also increases a person’s susceptibility.
Dr Decker said cervical cell changes in the cervix develops as a result of persistent infection from the HPV virus. The virus is extremely common and is easily transmitted from skin to skin especially the genital area. This means that the virus could be acquired without penetrative sex or full sexual intercourse and this also means that condoms may not do much by preventing women from acquiring the virus.
In a society where same sex is not strange, an infected female could pass the disease on to another female.
The sad part of the story is that abnormal cervical cell changes in the cervix rarely causes symptoms until it is getting late. The symptoms may only appear when the cell changes grow into cervical cancer.
These symptoms may include bleeding from the vagina which is not due to a change in menstrual cycle that can be explained, and bleeding when something comes into contact with the cervix such as sexual intercourse . Pain during sex and vaginal discharge tinged with blood are some of the symptoms of cervical cancer.
Fortunately there is a way of detecting the disease. This can be done by a test called the Pap Smear test. This means that the only way to prevent the disease from causing havoc is regular tests.
The Pap smear would 80 per cent of the time, show the cell changes before they turn into cancer so that if you have a problem early treatment could be done.
Since condoms are of little help when it comes to prevention of the disease, Dr Decker recommends abstinence or limiting the number of sex partners.
While Pap smear tests play a vital part by detecting the abnormal cells, the screening does not prevent infection of cancer-causing virus types. It is very helpful however because it is only when you have the disease that treatment can commence.
The treatment for cervical cancer includes cryotherapy , hysterectomy, cone biopsy, and laser treatment.
There is however hope for prevention — vaccination. There is a vaccine that may protect a woman against the disease in up to 70 per cent of cervical cancer cases.
According to Dr Decker, evidence from clinical trials had shown that vaccination alongside regular screening could reduce the chance of developing cervical cancer by 94 per cent, compared to no intervention.
Even though Dr Decker is preaching abstinence as a preventive method and the limitation of the number of sexual partners, regular screening seems to be a more helpful approach especially when a common handshake can also transmit the disease.
It is important for women to regularly go for pap tests and seek more information about the vaccine from their doctors in order to save their lives.
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