15 year-old stroke patient sits for BECE

A 15-year-old student of the First Baptist School in Tema, on Monday, defied medical advice and sat for the 2015 Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE).

The girl, who has been suffering from a stroke condition for the past one month, did not heed the advice of her doctors not to sit for the exams and showed up at the exams centre at the Tema Senior High School.

All efforts from Mrs Bossman Adotevi, the Headmistress of the First Baptist School, to convince the girl to abide by the medical advice proved futile as the candidate was seen comfortably sitting in the examination room smiling and insisting that she could write the exams.

Mrs Adotevi explained to the Ghana News Agency that the candidate’s whose name has been withheld, was a sickle cell patient, who has been having series of attacks.

She indicated that the stroke condition set in a month ago when she suffered one of those attacks leading to her doctor writing to the school not to allow her to sit for the exams.

She said she was surprised when the girl turned up on Monday to write the exams and all efforts to stop her yielded no result.

The Headmistress, who was visibly worried, said the girl, who was a right handed person would have to write the exams with the left hand since the stroke has affected the right part of her body.

She therefore pleaded with the Education Directorate and the exams authorities to give the girl some extra time to write the exams since she insisted on doing so.

Mr Isaac Ashai Odamtten, the Tema Metropolitan Chief Executive, and Mrs Veronica Adzato-Ntem, the Tema Metropolitan Director of Education, who paid a visit to the centre and heard of the plight of the stroke candidate, directed the supervisor of the centre to give her an extra 15 minutes to help her finish the exams.

Mrs Adzato-Ntem also instructed that a copy of her medical report should be attached to all the papers she would right.