Real Life Stories
GhanaJoanna Awuku Gyan
Community Nurse Joanna works on the frontline fighting malaria in Ghana, where malaria is still a leading killer of young children. In the last four years, Joanna has seen real progress in the fight against malaria. It used to be that over half of Joanna’s child patients were suffering from malaria but thanks to increased education and tools such as mosquito nets these numbers have been greatly reduced.
Mosquito nets are the first line of defence for malaria prevention but often simply not available in Africa. Last year and thanks to your support, we helped fund the distribution of over one million mosquito nets to protect two million people from malaria in Ghana, including everyone in Joanna’s neighbourhood. The success of this project has led to the Ghanaian government planning to extend the net programme to cover more regions this year. We look forward to supporting this work. As Joanna says: “I am pleased that our area is one of the first to benefit from this net campaign but the whole country is suffering with malaria – this campaign should be made the standard and provided to all. Please help us expand this net campaign across Ghana”.
This campaign should be made the standard and provided to all. Please help us expand this net campaign across Ghana
Part of Joanna’s role as a nurse is to educate people in her community about how they can take simple steps to protect themselves from malaria. She is pictured here after speaking about malaria prevention at a village gathering (known as Durbars!), organised by the project and the village Chief. This local leadership is critical to Ghana’s long term success in the fight against malaria.
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Joanna Awuku Gyan
Community Nurse Joanna works on the frontline fighting malaria in Ghana, where malaria claims more lives of young children than any other single disease.
