Ghana: On the occasion of World Prematurity Day 2019, the African Foundation for Premature Babies and Neonatal Care (AFPNC) managed to do their biggest community outreach with about 400 community members including women, teenage girls, healthcare professionals, traditional leaders and the political and corporate fraternity in the remote district in Ghana where access to basic neonatal care is a challenge and recorded the highest deaths in the last 5 years till date.
The situation fits perfectly to this year’s World Prematurity Day’s global theme “Born too Soon: providing the right care, at the right time, in the right place.”, and so, AFPNC collaborated with the Health Directorate to implement their outreach initiatives. Organising such a programme did not come without challenges since the location was about a 12-hour drive away and resources were severely constraint. Notwithstanding the organisation managed to pull things off and achieved a great milestone in raising awareness for pressing issues in neonatal care.
Besides a community durbar and girls’ empowerment about reproductive health, new, needy mums of preterm babies could join the purple basket project where they received up to 2 weeks’ groceries and toiletries for their baby and themselves.
Selina Bentoom, CEO of AFPNC (8th from left), is a Founding Committee Member of GLANCE.
