The Country Manager of Zipline Ghana, Daniel Kwaku Merki, has dismissed claims that the company’s drone delivery service is being misused to transport non-essential items, including condoms and textbooks.
His comments come in response to allegations by the Minister of Health, Kwabena Mintah Akandoh, who stated during the Government Accountability Series on Monday, December 1, 2025, that the multi-million-dollar drone programme has strayed from its original purpose of delivering emergency, life-saving medical supplies to hard-to-reach communities.
Speaking on Adom TV’s Badwam, Mr. Merki insisted that deliveries of non-medical items are “extremely rare.”
He explained that only one in 20,000 flights involves items such as condoms, and even then, these requests come from agencies under the Ministry of Health, not from Zipline itself.
“Critical life-saving commodities, which we have delivered, have saved lives in the tune of 10,000. There are emergencies we attend to, and many nuances to these critical deliveries. We follow a list provided by the Ministry of Health of products we are mandated to deliver,” he said.
Mr. Merki emphasised that Zipline simply executes requests placed by the appropriate health agencies.
“Supply continuously comes from the agencies under the Ministry of Health. Even if you want to dig deeper on this issue, I’m not the best person to answer, because we work with the Ministry and its agencies to ensure the most critical deliveries are made,” he added.
When asked whether condoms were part of Zipline’s approved delivery items, Mr. Merki clarified that they were not delivered as standalone packages.
“These condoms were not delivered on their own. They were included alongside other medical commodities,” he explained.
