The Upper East Regional Health Directorate is pushing for a testing centre for the novel coronavirus at the Navrongo Research Centre in the Kassena-Nankana Municipality.
The directorate expects the Navrongo Research Centre to have the testing capacity in two weeks.
Currently, the Noguchi Memorial Institute for Medical Research in Accra and the Kumasi Centre for Collaborative Research in Tropical Medicine (KCCR) in the Ashanti Region are the designated centres for COVID-19 testing.
The pressure on these two centres in some cases has resulted in the delayed release of laboratory test results.
Speaking at a press conference in Bolgatanga, Upper East Regional Director of Health Services, Dr Winfred Ofosu, hinted that plans are far advanced to certify the research centre for COVID-19 laboratory testing.
“We have recognized that the two centres are not sufficient to meet the needs of the population, so the ministry together with Ghana Health Service is scaling up”.
“There will be another centre in Tamale for us but we are also pushing the Ministry of Health and the Presidential COVID-19 committee to establish a testing centre at the Navrongo Research centre because we have got the relevant equipment.”
“They have agreed and have actually asked the Kumasi Centre for Collaborative Research (KCCR) to send their engineers to come and set it up and if that is done, in the next two weeks, we will not need to suffer to send specimens and get results in on time within 24 hours,” he explained.
Dr. Ofosu further attributed the delays in getting the COVID-19 patient results on time due to lack of testing facility in the region.
“Part of the problem was the delay in getting the results, it took almost a week after taking the specimen to get the results. If we had gotten the results within 24 hours, some of these slips would not have happened.”
