Ghana Must Look Beyond Accra to Be Truly Ready for Ebola, Lawmaker Warns

As the World Health Organisation scrambles to contain a fast-moving Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda, a Ghanaian parliamentarian is challenging the government’s narrative that the country is fully prepared for the deadly virus — and his critique cuts to the heart of a long-standing problem in Ghanaian public health planning.

Dr Kingsley Agyemang, a member of Parliament’s Health Committee, told Channel One TV this week that Ghana’s emergency response systems remain dangerously weak outside the capital, Accra. His comments carry particular weight given the severity of the current outbreak, which the WHO has declared a Public Health Emergency of International Concern.

The numbers are alarming. As of May 21, the WHO had recorded 746 suspected cases and 176 suspected deaths in the DRC, with 85 confirmed cases across the DRC and Uganda, including 10 deaths. More recent updates suggest suspected cases may have exceeded 900, with over 220 suspected deaths. The outbreak is driven by the rare Bundibugyo strain of the Ebola virus — a variant for which there is currently no approved vaccine and no specific treatment.

The crisis has been compounded by insecurity in eastern DRC, attacks on health facilities, overcrowded displacement camps, and fragile healthcare systems. The WHO has warned explicitly that the disease is spreading faster than containment efforts can keep pace with.

Against this backdrop, the Director-General of the Ghana Health Service, Professor Samuel Kaba Akoriyea, has assured the public that surveillance, screening, and emergency response systems have been strengthened. But Dr Agyemang disagrees — and his argument deserves serious attention.

He contends that preparedness assessments conducted by the Ghana Health Service and the Ministry of Health appear to be heavily concentrated on selected facilities in Accra, creating what he describes as a false impression of nationwide readiness. The implication is troubling: the authorities may be measuring the country’s capacity against the standards of its best-equipped urban hospitals while ignoring the vast gaps that exist in district and regional facilities.

The head of the World Health Organisation has already issued an urgent appeal for an immediate ceasefire in eastern DRC, warning that ongoing armed conflict is driving mass displacement and making containment of the outbreak nearly impossible. Ghana’s proximity to the crisis, while not direct, is close enough to demand a robust domestic response.

“How would district and regional hospitals respond if an Ebola case were detected in areas such as Sege, Ada, or other communities outside the capital?” Dr Agyemang asked. It is a question the government has not adequately answered.

His assessment of the country’s overall capacity for handling highly infectious diseases is blunt: “woefully inadequate,” particularly in disease surveillance, rapid response, and medical logistics. He has called for increased investment in district and regional health infrastructure, improved training for frontline health workers, and stronger emergency coordination systems nationwide.

The critique echoes a broader pattern in Ghana’s public health architecture. Time and again, national health initiatives — from vaccination campaigns to disease surveillance — have been evaluated on the basis of Accra’s performance, only for rural and peri-urban communities to be caught short when a crisis strikes. The Ebola threat merely makes the stakes of this urban-centric approach existential.

Ghana does not share a border with the DRC or Uganda, which provides a geographic buffer. But in an era of air travel and porous regional borders, proximity is not the only risk factor. A single undetected case arriving at Kotoka International Airport — or entering through an unmonitored land border — could expose every weakness in the system.

The country’s response to Covid-19 demonstrated both the strengths and limitations of its health infrastructure. Urban centres performed relatively well, but rural communities struggled with testing capacity, contact tracing, and access to care. There is no reason to believe an Ebola outbreak would be handled differently unless deliberate investments are made to close the gap.

Dr Agyemang’s call for a district-level assessment of readiness is the right starting point. Ghana’s preparedness cannot be judged by demonstrations in a handful of urban hospitals while dozens of facilities across the country lack basic logistics, trained personnel, and coordination protocols. The government would do well to heed his warning before the virus finds its way to West Africa — because by then, it will be too late to discover what was missing.

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