He said the design of healthcare programmes and service delivery, especially in local communities should be made to include traditional authorities, political leaders, faith leaders, development partners and other relevant stakeholders whose involvement would help improve and sustain gains achieved in the health sector.

Mr. Boateng explained that there had been many cases where health infrastructure such as hospitals, community health centres, Community-Based Health Planning and Services (CHPS) compounds and others, remained non-functional for years.

This he said was due to the lack of proper consultations and co-operation with the relevant stakeholders in the inception and design of the process as well as the implementation of the projects.

Mr Boateng made the call when a team from the World Vision International Ghana (WVI-G) paid a courtesy call on him at his office at Agogo.  The visit was for the team made up of officials from the national headquarters and local representatives of the WVI-G, to assess the impact of the Health and Nutrition project being implemented by the organisation in the area.

It was also to help collate the views and concerns of the local authorities on how the partnership between the Assembly and WVI-G could be further strengthened to improve health services delivery and increase access to primary health care in the area.

Touching on the health situation in the District, Mr Boateng spoke of the lack of adequate health infrastructure and logistics, especially in the rural and deprived communities. He commended WVI-G for the various health interventions in the area over the years, especially in the area of community health sensitisation and awareness creation programmes, which had had a lot of positive impact on the maternal, child and general health care in the district.

He urged the WVI-G and other development partners supporting the process of improving health services delivery and access to primary health care in the area to confer with the District Assembly when drawing their road map of activities, projects or programmes in order to meet the priority needs of the people to achieve the desired results.

Mr. Micah Ayo Olad, the Health, Nutrition and HIV/AIDS Specialist of WVI-G mentioned the Community Health Committees, Mother to Mother Support Groups (MTMSG), Savings for Transformation (S4T) as some of the interventions being implemented to improve healthcare delivery in the area.

Mr. Roland Micah, the District Health Director said the collaborative support of WVI-G in terms of capacity building and communities’ sensitisation /engagement on health issues had contributed a great deal to improve healthcare service delivery in the area.

He urged WVI-G and other development partners to consider supporting the District to help improve health infrastructure and logistics, which was a major challenge in the area, particularly in the rural communities.