The Headmistress of Ola Girls Senior High School(SHS) at Kenyasi, Ahafo Region, Reverend(Rev) Sister Antoinette Abiwu, has called for financial support to help disinfect and fumigate second cycle schools in the country often for two(2) reasons.
Her call popped-up when her school had its share of the National Disinfection and Fumigation exercise under the auspices of the Ghana Education Service(GES) and Zoomlion Ghana Limited(ZGL) with the aim of fighting the spread of COVID-19 as the exercise hits Ahafo Region.
In an interview, the Rev. Sister Abiwu passionately appealed to parents, individuals, and companies to come to the aide of schools to disinfect and fumigate on time to save coffers and prevent all forms of sicknesses affecting students.
According to her, parents especially must assist the disinfection and fumigation exercise at least once in a term to help kill all kinds of insects making the living conditions on campus unhealthy.
She stated that the buying of the chemicals and hiring people to undertake the exercise is costly and it is causing the delay of spraying schools on time and as expected to conditioned students well to study.
Sighting her school with a population of 1,193 as an example, the Headmistress revealed that an amount ranging from 3000 to 6000 cedis is allocated to roll – out the disinfection and fumigation exercise which is so costly to handle.
She expressed gratitude to the Asutifi North District Chief Executive(DCE), Anthony Mensah, for assisting the school at times to execute the exercise on time to help the students to have the full concentration to study and also to prevent them from diseases.
“The government is trying but with others coming in to support the exercise will be best” she stated.
Addressing the disadvantages of the lack of disinfection and fumigation exercise, the Head explained, students, are unable to sleep well because the bedbugs and other insects show-up at night to attack them making them unstable during class time for full concentration.
“Most sleep in classrooms as teaching is in progress due to them unable to sleep as expected at night,” she said.
Secondly, their skins develop rashes due to how the insects attack them making them(skins) rough and uncomfortable. This turns to temper the health status of the students pushing them to visit school’s health bay, clinics and hospitals often for treatment which is also time wasting affecting their studies.
Rev. Sister Antoinette Abiwu added, some of the insects popping – up as a result of the absence and insufficient disinfection and fumigation exercise attack and damage the books of both the students and the school. She explained, insect like cockroach does not spare books when it get access.
She pointed out that teachers are also not left out when it comes to the effects insects bring with the absence of the spraying. According to her, at times teachers send exercise books home to mark and before they reliased insects especially bedbugs are with them. This gives them no option than to use their own funds to get chemicals to embark on spraying their bungalows for them and their families to be safe.
She said once schools are assisted to disinfect and fumigate often and on time, students and teachers will have the best serene environment for their activities. They can either support the schools partially or fully to spray especially the dormitories and classrooms where the insects breed more to attack the students.
“This is not beyond the financial strength of parents so step in to help” she stated.
