Jacqui Fairbanks, has been helping the sex workers in Hull’s Hessle Road for ten years and says there are currently around 40 of them working in the area at various times.

Many come from backgrounds where they have been abused physically and sexually while many of them are homeless and sleep on sofas.

Mental health problems are common and there are problems of trafficking and coercion by pimps and boyfriends, explained the officer.

‘One woman had a baby and, within half an hour, was back out on the streets. That’s how desperate some of these women are,’ she told the Hull Daily Mail.

‘This isn’t Pretty Woman, I’m afraid. Some rich punter isn’t going to come along and sweep these women off their feet and live happily ever after.

‘Our problem is that these women will not come and deal with us. Their self-esteem is so low that they enjoy the attention they receive and that is really sad.’

PCSO Fairbanks said the age ranged women in their late 20s or early 30s to a couple of women in their 60s though ‘thankfully we don’t have any young girls on the streets in Hull’.

When it comes to customers said : ‘We have lads as young as 17 or 18 using these sex workers and the age range goes up to those in their 80s.

‘They are all from different backgrounds and cultures. There are those who are very affluent and those who are unemployed.’

She said that the police work work very closely with other agencies, such as social services, the Together Women Project. Lighthouse, the Vineyard and Humbercare.

PCSO Fairbanks says the lack of sympathy for prostitutes can be unfair.

‘There is a perception that these women are all on benefits but that is not always the case. For many, this is their only source of income.

‘At the end of the day these women are somebody’s daughter. I try to tell them they are better than this. But all we can do is off them the help through the different agencies.

One thing PCSO Fairbanks is relieved about the reduction in violence.

‘We have managed things better now and there is less violence towards these women,’ she said.

‘There will always be dodgy pimps and violent boyfriends but, otherwise, the women are quick to tell us if they have been victims of violence. We have a better rapport.

‘It has been around ten years since the last murder of a sex worker.’

In a landmark ruling in 2014, section 222 orders were introduced meaning prostitutes and kerb crawlers found breaching the order by loitering, soliciting or having sex, face arrest.

Plain-clothes officers have been employed to catch kerb crawlers approaching prostitutes.

In the last three months, there has been police engagement with 26 kerb crawlers. There has been 16 section 222 orders have been handed out to users and a further 12 warnings issued.

The long-term plan is to put kerb crawlers on courses rather than sending them to court.

In the last three months there has been police engagement with 42 sex workers. There have been 33 section 222 orders handed out, 32 warnings issued and there has been 32 breaches of those orders, sometimes by the same person multiple times.

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Source: Daily Mail

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The National Population Council NPC had earlier described the 2.5% annual population growth of Ghana as alarming. And renewed calls for limiting the number of children per couples to three. In the view of its Executive Director Dr. Leticia Appiah, this will improve the quality of life of Ghanaians and reduce the pressure on social amenities.

But Prof. Kwakye questioned the claims that the population growth rate is alarming. “Our population growth has always been how we find it. It has always hovered around 2.5%. In fact it used to be 2.7% per annum. Earlier it was even estimated to be 3% in the 70’s and we at 2.5% so I don’t see why that alone should alarm anybody,” he argues.

Instead of ‘lamenting’ Prof. Kwakye contends that Ghana has a great ‘advantage’ with the growth.

“Looking at the population structure it is showing that we have some positive developments which we should take advantage of instead of lament that 2.5% is alarming. Especially if you’re not in the position to say that all of it coming from fertility. We have mortality, fertility, and migration as well. As at now, we are not even sure of the contribution of migration to our population growth because we don’t have the data. If you have a growth rate of 2.5% and you have a population structure below 15 years shrinking then you should also have a mind to say that a growth rate of 2.5% is not because fertility is that high and therefore I am not too sure whether to describe our population growth as alarming.”

For Prof. Kwakye it is critical to expand the economy  to provide jobs for the teeming mass of the population of the youth adding that, “Ghana has long moved beyond mere numbers when the economy expands with adequate provision of jobs and skills for people. They themselves will become the human resource that will turn the economy around. You don’t need the numbers. The quality is what is important.”

He challenged the feasibility of legislating the outcome of private interactions of individuals, saying “I don’t see how anybody can legislate that nobody should have more than 3 children. I don’t think it’s feasible. They shouldn’t try it.”

According to him, calls for limiting child birth  is an excuse for economic mismanagement over the years, ‘because we are unable to manage our resources very well, we think that it is that numbers that is creating the problems. I agree that if my resources at my disposal can not take of my children, and I have 3 of them, obviously the quality of life will be compromised. But if you say nobody should have more than 3, I can assure there are some who have only 1 but cannot take care of them while others have five and can take good care of them”

Focusing on the health of mothers who have many children will help reduce the incidence of high, he reasons, ‘the emphasis should be on the health of the mother. When the mother has too many births the health implications can be very grave. So that is the angle I think the emphasis should be such that you regulate in way that if people come to appreciate that if I have too many children it will have grave implications on my health then why don’t I have fewer’.

He proposed in addition other alternatives to reducing child births, ‘gradually as we sensitize people and then we present them with accessible and affordable family planning methods, a time will come the 3 that we are talking about will be even too high for the people when they talk their individual decisions.

He said legislating child birth may incur the rebellion of the people, “if you’re not very careful and you legislate it will backfire. People will rebel. So appeal to them. Present them with affordable and accessible family planning methods, let them get educated, that’s why another root to this is empowering women by educating the girl child not forgetting the boy child.”

Explaining why the poor have more children while the rich have fewer Prof. noted “the rich people who are educated will insist on quality education. So they want to invest in the education of the child to whatever level. So if I want to insist on quality education and I have more than two or three quality will be compromised that’s what we call in demographic analysis the cycle of poverty through population or high fertility. But the poor think they can’t boast of any good life of shelter. And so they always hide behind religious beliefs that it is God who caters for everybody so once they give birth the relay on God hoping that one of their children will become successful and take care of them. That’s where education comes in.”

Prof. Kwakye said If education is universally accessible andthere is every possibility people with reason along and reduce births voluntarily, stating that “at the same time if the resources are well managed there will be jobs for the youth and overcrowding can be checked. By so doing we won’t just grow in terms of numbers but quality too so that every hand will be able to feed itself.”

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By: Caleb Kudah/citifmonline.com/Ghana

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The Mother-Baby Friendly Health Facility Initiative (MBHFI) is the ninth of 14 strategies being implemented by the Ghana Health Service under its National Newborn strategy and action plan, with support from UNICEF through the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation.

The project, which aims at ending all preventable maternal and newborn deaths towards achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030,  was piloted in four selected districts of the region namely Bolgatanga municipal, Bawku municipal, Bongo and Kassena-Nankana West districts.

According to Dr Priscilla Wobil, the program has brought significant improvement in the quality of health care and rendered mothers and their babies with a reduction in stillbirths and neonatal mortality.

Speaking in an interview with Citi News, at the first quarter review meeting held in Bolgatanga, Dr.Wobil  attributed the commitment of health personnel and their leaders at the districts and regional for the success chalked.

“From October to December, they [health personnel] worked on improving counseling, to ensure that every mother who comes to the facility to deliver will be counseled on breast feeding,  family planning, new born and maternal danger signs so that if there is any problem, they can come to the facility immediately for redress”.

She impressed on health personnel in the region to work hard at ensuring the region attains the objectives of the programme.

The National Director of family health department of the Ghana health service, Dr. Patrick Kuma Aboagye said even though Ghana received an award as the best maternal mortality improved country in Africa, there was the need to still improve the quality of health care at facilities.

He added that, the establishment of nutrition clinics, increase in data collection and distribution of iron foliage to menstruating women (aged 10 to 19) were among others strategies of addressing maternal and neonatal dangers.

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By: Frederick Awuni/citifmonline.com/Ghana

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