Some persons who have recovered from Covid-19 at one of the country’s treatment centres are dreadful of returning home due to possible stigma encounters.
According to Joy News’ Sports Journalist, Gary Al-Smith, some patients, who are still receiving treatment, have not informed their relatives they are at a Covid-19 treatment centre for fear of being shunned.
“There are two people here who told me that, their families think they have gone out of Accra for meetings or work-related travels,” he told Winston Amoah on Joy FM’s Super Morning Show Monday.
Gary Al-Smith, who is currently at the University of Ghana Medical Centre since he tested positive for the virus, further revealed that some recovered patients fear to return home even after discharge.
“Some people mentioned that they are not afraid to go home but they are afraid of what will happen when they go back to work,” he said.
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He further added that: “We are all paying for the fact that we don’t really know much about the disease and it is all feeding into the stigma.”
In President Nana Akufo-Addo’s 12th televised address on Sunday, he appealed to Ghanaians to accept persons who have recovered from the disease as stigma was still a hindrance to the fight against the virus.
He said there was nothing shameful about contracting the disease.
On his part, Director-General of the Ghana Health Service, Dr Patrick Kuma Aboagye, said more education was needed to disabuse the minds of people who somehow believe recovered patients could still spread the disease.
“We need to talk about the fact that contracting the disease doesn’t mean you did something wrong or it is a death sentence. In this new discharge policy, we must assure the people [Ghanaians] that the people who are coming out are not infectious,” he said.
