ACCRA — The Rockefeller Foundation and United States Agency for International Development (USAID) announce the delivery of 1,829 digital tablets to support the Ghana Health Service’s (GHS) five-day national COVID-19 immunization campaign, which began on December 14, 2022. With more frontline health workers equipped with technology to capture critical COVID-19 vaccination data during health outreach visits across Ghana, GHS can better identify remaining coverage gaps and address barriers to access. The campaign’s goal is to boost vaccine coverage by addressing misperceptions about the virus and countering persistent vaccine misinformation, while the tablets will strengthen GHS’ overall capacity to collect, analyze, and share data for routine immunizations and other primary health services.
Today, less than 40% of eligible Ghanaians have received at least one COVID-19 shot, compared to nearly 70% globally. The new tablets — alongside key investments from the Ghanaian government and other funders — are helping advance the Ministry of Health’s commitments to vaccinate 18.2 million people against Covid-19 by the end of 2023 and increase GHS’ use of electronic health (e-health) information technology to deliver health services. In addition to digital devices, the United States has donated more than 12 million Covid-19 vaccine doses to support GHS’s national immunization efforts.
“Ghanaian health workers are the country’s first line of defense against any emerging health threat,” said Linda Vanotoo, senior program director of Community and Primary Health Workforce at Results for Development. “The devices will help them expand data collection to rural and remote areas, improving availability of data for planning and minimizing administrative burden for health workers.”
