Ghana must actively screen healthy people for hypertension and chronic disease -CDD

A Fellow in Public Health at the Centre for Democratic Development (CDD-Ghana), Kwame Sarpong Asiedu, has said Ghana must move from a healthcare system that waits for sick people to report to hospitals to one that actively screens apparently healthy people for chronic diseases. Speaking on the Joy FM Super Morning Show on Thursday, September 10, during a discussion on hypertension, Mr Asiedu said a large number of people could be living with hypertension and other cardiovascular diseases without knowing it because the conditions often show no obvious symptoms. His comments came after concerns about estimates suggesting that about 70% of Ghanaians could be hypertensive without knowing it.

Read also: Cardiologist warns uncontrolled hypertension is killing more Ghanaians below 50 He said the concern should extend to cardiovascular diseases more broadly, including conditions linked to high cholesterol. “I don’t want us to limit it to hypertension on its own,” Mr Asiedu said. “Cardiovascular disease generally, because sometimes people even don’t know that high cholesterol in itself and the position of cholesterol in the bloodstream can decrease the blood flow to the penile area as well,” he explained. According to him, many people in Ghana could have elevated cholesterol levels without being aware of it. “A lot of people are walking around with elevated cholesterol levels in Ghana. They have no idea,” he said. He said that cardiovascular disease is a broad category and includes hypertension and coronary heart disease, among others. “So I go, and I say cardiovascular diseases; hypertension is one of them. Coronary heart disease can be another,” he said. Mr Asiedu attributed the problem partly to the lack of widespread screening for chronic diseases. “And why does that…