Improving Health Status
USAID's Health program aims at decreasing mortality among women and children under five by expanding access to quality health services and reducing the impact and spread of malaria, HIV/AIDS, and other infectious diseases, and increasing the use of family planning. The program empowers individuals and communities to adopt positive health practices and strengthens the capacity of community and district-level health officers to plan and manage health programs.
The following are some activities:
Preventing and controlling malaria:
Under the Presidential Malaria Initiative, Health program focuses on scaling up proven malaria control interventions targeting children under five and pregnant women. The initiative promotes indoor residual spraying; insecticide treated bed nets; effective case management and improved diagnostics; and provision of intermittent preventative treatment in pregnancy.
Reducing transmission and impact of HIV/AIDS:
With the President's Emergency Plan for HIV/AIDS Relief, USAID works with the Government of Ghana and other partners to combat HIV/AIDS through service delivery, policy reform, and coordinated financial commitments.
Improving maternal and child survival, reproductive health, and nutrition:
USAID promotes safe motherhood by supporting quality improvements in maternal and child health services during pregnancy, delivery and the postnatal period and community outreach on the importance of using these health services. As a part of the Feed the Future Initiative, USAID works with the Ghana Health Service to decrease malnutrition in children under five. USAID also supports activities that increase awareness and use of family planning methods, improve the quality of family planning services, and promote free and informed choice of clients among a wide range of methods.
Reducing transmission of infectious diseases and diarrhea:
USAID is working to increase the availability and quality of water, improve sanitation, and increase community capacity in using and maintaining water and sanitation facilities. USAID also supports tuberculosis control, and mass treatment campaigns for five neglected Tropical Diseases in endemic areas.
In FY2010, USAID trained over 28,000 health care workers, provided 1.7 million bed nets, and conducted more than 150 technical activities such as training, supervision, and quality assurance. USAID also improved management capacity at the regional and district level.