Advocating for Sickle Cell Education in Ghana's JHS & SHS

By Rebecca Ampah The Focus on Sickle Cell Foundation (FoSCel) is calling for sickle cell education to be formally integrated into Ghana’s Junior High School (JHS) and Senior High School (SHS) curriculum, as part of efforts to tackle stigma, misinformation and improve understanding of the condition among young people. Speaking at a press conference at the Press Centre today, Founder of FoSCel, Amos Andoh, said the foundation’s advocacy aligns with the national sickle cell strategy, in which the Ministry of Health has proposed the inclusion of sickle cell education in the country’s education curriculum. He explained that FoSCel began a sickle cell awareness tour last year and has completed a pilot phase in the Central Region. As part of the project, the foundation designed a comic model to help students understand sickle cell disease in a simple and engaging way. “We realised that a lot of the students are very ignorant about sickle cell, so we are proposing to the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Education to consider students from the basic level when they want to inculcate sickle cell education in the curriculum,” he said. Mr Andoh noted that many people living with sickle cell are in schools and face stigma, sometimes even from teachers. He recounted that during school visits, some students asked whether sickle cell could be contracted through hugs, even though the condition is inherited. He urged authorities to prioritise education on sickle cell to correct such misconceptions and create a more supportive school environment for affected students. Addressing persons living with sickle cell, Mr Andoh, who said he is a journalist and a person living with the condition, encouraged them not to lose hope. “Having sickle cell is not the death sentence that people think,” he said, advising patients to take their medication as prescribed by doctors and maintain healthy lifestyles. He added, “The condition is not easy, but please we don’t want to hear that a person with sickle cell is depressed because of the condition.”