Pregnant women who are due for delivery and newborn babies share beds with men at the maternity ward at the Community-based Health Planning and Services (CHPS) compound at Akyem Kusi in the Dekyembour District of the Eastern Region.
Senior staff midwife in-charge of the Akyem Kusi CHPS compound, Martha Aduako Lartey, is unhappy at the way the facility has to accommodate men and women in the same ward which has just two beds.
According to her, women who are due for delivery become uncomfortable because they complain that they have to bare their nakedness before strangers of the opposite sex.
Mrs.Aduako Lartey made this known when Ghana Sumatra LTD donated mattresses, four hospital beds, BP Monitor Machine, and other health equipment to help improve the quality healthcare delivery in the area.
She added that the lack of facilities for health delivery in the area culminated in many pregnant women delivering their babies on the floor before being attended to.
The in charge, therefore, appealed to organisations and individuals who can help to come forth because the facility needs a lot of logistics and equipment to work.
Meanwhile, the general manager of Ghana Sumatra Ltd, Thomas Darkogre, explained that the gesture is to improve the living standard of vulnerable people in the most deprived communities in the district.
On his part, the chief of Akyem Kusi, Nana Ntiamoah Kusi Boadu II, appealed to the Ministry of Health to upgrade the CHPS compound into a hospital.
According to him, the CHPS compound was built during the Second Republic and needed to be upgraded into a hospital considering the increased population in the area.