New Born Babies go home unregistered

Investigations have established that government hospitals in Accra have no birth registration forms.

Sleuth checks conducted by the paper at hospitals including Ridge Hospital, Police Hospital, Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital, 37 Military Hospital, revealed that the problem has lingered on for the past three months.

This reporter further gathered that this has become a source of worry to mothers who gave birth within the said period and could not have their babies registered.

The situation, has hindered the smooth registration of a number of babies born within the period.

It also establishes the fact that babies who have been born within this period have not been registered yet as Ghanaian citizens.

Senior doctors and nurses working in the said hospitals, however, declined to comment on the matter when the paper caught up with them.

Sources close to the Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development hinted Today that the ministry is responsible for releasing funds for the printing of birth registration forms which are in turn supplied to government hospitals.

The source also indicated that the sector Minister, Joseph Yieleh Chireh, was yet to release funds for the printing of the forms.

The sector minister in an interview confirmed the story.

He indicated that he had received an appeal from the various health centres and was doing everything possible within his powers to ensure that the problem is resolved.

However, he noted that “The Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development is not responsible for the release or provision of funds for the printing of the birth registration forms, but rather the responsibility of the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning, so nobody should blame my ministry for the shortage.”

Though hospital authorities remain tight-lipped over the matter, reports say some junior health workers are getting increasingly worried about the situation.

Some expressed serious concerns over the lacklustre attitude on the part of their senior colleague doctors and nurses to go public with the matter since the registration of babies born in hospitals, just as the on-going national population and housing census would help government to plan ahead for the future.

“This problem has persisted since the month of July and you can just imagine the number of babies who have been born from that month till date and have not been registered. Our senior health workers sit here every time to talk about it and end up blaming government when they can voice out for the government to act as early as practicable,” lamented one of the junior health workers at Police Hospital.

“We just can’t comprehend why our senior officials have decided to keep mute over this critical issue. Why am I saying it is critical? It is because the registration of new born babies born within a specific period of time could help government put structures in place for the future; so I don’t know why everyone is silent. The most annoying aspect of the problem is that these forms are not free they are sold to the public so where do the monies generated from the sale of the forms go?,” another health worker wondered.