A/R: Aboboyaa, okada and wooden structures are our ambulances’ – Ataso residents cry for help
Residents of Ataso, a farming community in the Atwima Mponua District of the Ashanti Region, are appealing for urgent government intervention as they endure severe challenges in accessing healthcare.
With no clinic, health post, or ambulance service, the community has resorted to using wooden structures, motor tricycles popularly called aboboyaa, and motorbikes (okada) as makeshift ambulances to convey the sick, pregnant women, and accident victims to hospitals in nearby towns.
According to residents, emergency situations often turn into heartbreaking scenes as patients are strapped onto wooden carriers and carried on foot to the roadside before being transferred onto a motorbike or aboboyaa.
The deplorable state of the roads further complicates the journey to the nearest health facilities in Kotokuom, Nkawie, or Toase.
“We have no ambulance here, no clinic, nothing. If someone is sick or a woman is in labour and there is no motorbike, we tie her onto a wooden structure and carry her on our shoulders until we reach the roadside. Sometimes we place patients on an aboboyaa or okada, even though it is risky, because that is the only way to save lives,” a resident lamented.
The community’s hopes of getting a health facility have been stalled due to a land dispute. The Ataso Unit Committee revealed that land had earlier been secured for the construction of a Community-Based Health Planning and Services (CHPS) compound, but the project was abandoned after the community’s Odikro, Nana Owusu Adadeh, objected to the location, insisting that the land was part of a cemetery. Vice Chairman of the Unit Committee, Kwame Ben, explained that efforts to secure an alternative site have so far proved futile.
He has therefore appealed to the Chief of Atwima-Agogo, Nana Okyere Poku II, as well as the District Chief Executive and the Ashanti Regional Minister, to urgently intervene so that work on the CHPS compound can begin.
“Our mothers, children, and elders are suffering. We are begging authorities to hear our cry. Healthcare is a right, not a privilege,” a resident pleaded.
Kwame Ben reinforced the call with a passionate appeal: “We cannot continue to carry pregnant women on wooden structures or put patients on okada and aboboyaa just to keep them alive. We need urgent intervention now. We are appealing to our leaders to act before another life is lost.”
Residents fear that without immediate action, more lives will be lost as medical emergencies go unattended. They are appealing to government, NGOs, and philanthropists to provide Ataso with a health facility, ambulance services, and improved roads.
The plight of Ataso highlights the broader healthcare challenges rural communities across Ghana continue to face. Until their plea is answered, wooden structures, aboboyaa, and okada will remain the only lifeline to hospitals.
Source: Ghaan/otecfmghana.com
