The Minister of Health, Kweku Agyemang Manu has debunked assertion that congestion in schools as a result of the implementation of the Free Senior High School programme is the cause of meningitis, H1N1 Influenza recorded on some campuses.

He maintains that the death toll would have been higher if congestion was the cause of the outbreak.

The Health Minister’s stance contradicts the position earlier espoused by the Ghana Health Service(GHS). The Head of Disease and Surveillance Unit at the GHS, identified congestion at Senior High Schools (SHSs) as one risk factor for the spread of meningitis.

Dr Franklin Asiedu-Bekoe told Joy FM the crowded nature of classrooms and dormitories at SHSs poses a challenge to students.

“If the pathogen is in your throat [and] so far as you are one meter apart the other person can get it,” he explained.

Another student of the Tempane Senior High School in the Upper East Region died from meningitis Saturday. The deceased, a third year student who had been on admission at the Bawku Presbyterian Hospital where he’d been in critical condition, is the second student to die in a week.

Out of the nine students who had been admitted, six have been discharged remaining three who are currently in good condition.

This unfortunate incident follows the death of one student of the Bawku Senior High Technical School from meningits, while five students are on admission at the hospital.

There is also a recorded case of the disease at the Damango SHS in the Northern Region.

Many students at the Kumasi Academy in the Ashanti Region are currently on admission receiving treatment from Influenza Type A popularly referred to as Swine Flu. Four of them have already died from the disease.

A student of the Koforidua Secondary Technical School (SECTECH) has also died of suspected Meningitis at the Koforidua General Hospital. 22 students are currently being monitored after they came in contact with the deceased student.

But speaking to Joy FM the Health Minister insisted that congestion is not the major cause of the disease outbreak.

“Those attributing this to congestion I wouldn’t know what evidence and information they have. But when there’s a challenge and it’s the public health people who should deal with the matter, I believe we’ll have to take whatever information they give us as the most reliable information but not people sitting outside who might not even know where the problems are coming from. 

“If there’s congestion in a school and there’re twenty five students sleeping where five students should sleep and there’s meningitis it won’t attack only one person, these are logical issues anybody else would want to interrogate the matter with. I don’t think that is the major challenge there, other than that the case burden would have been higher… that incidence would have been higher and not the numbers we’re looking at. I don’t want to believe it’s because of congestion.”