The Minister of Health, Alex Segbefia has called for a public private partnership in the training of doctors in the country.
He insists that the move will help reduce the burden on government to solely train doctors and also improve the doctor to patients’ ratio statistics in the country which currently stand at one doctor to over 9,000 patients.
[contextly_sidebar id=”wTmMcu0DTn9NZRk5DPRdptKjy69PdXzI”]Currently two privately owned medical schools have started training some 40 doctors in Ghana.
One of them, the Family Health Medical School was on Tuesday commissioned at Teshie, a suburb of Accra.
Speaking to Citi Newsafter the the Health Minister, Alex Segbefia opined that such an initiative is a laudable one but called for strict supervision of these institutions.
He explained that government has the mandate of providing such facilities, it cannot do it alone hence encouraging private sector participation.
“…Now we have two private and we are encouraging the private sector to kick start such initiatives. All these two private medical schools came into being in the last two years and we should encourage more like this.”
Mr. Segbefia noted that the “this is a plus for government because we are now walking the talk.”
“We are saying that government will do its bid but government alone cannot do all, private enterprise needed to come into the sector. I think that government should be commended for encouraging either private participation or public private participation but the standards don’t drop because it is set by the Medical and Dental Council,” he added.
President Mahama who commissioned the Family Health Medical School indicated that government will continue to support private individuals who would want to partner the state in its quest to provide health care to all Ghanaians.
Among the personalities who graced the occasion, were former Presidents Kufuor and Jerry John Rawlings.
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By: Godwin A. Allotey/citifmonline.com/Ghana