KATH/Gee Hospital Still Is Another Kwame Nkrumah Sika Duro (2.0)

Continued from Part I....


1954-1966: THE "SIKA DURO" FACTOR IN THE KUMASI CENTRAL HOSPITAL:
To move on with our look into the data, we are not aware of any studies that looked into the number of people (mothers, fathers, daughters and sons, etc.,), in Kumasi (and in the Ashanti Region, even), who died needlessly just 20 years after the overthrow of Nkrumah's government because population had grown greatly and there was no capacity at the KATH. Then consider that the KATH has for the longest been the primary hospital for referrals also for Brong Ahafo, Volta, and the regions in northern Ghana.

Even so, there was good news, but mostly during 1954-1966!

Consider that a fair estimate of inhabitants of Ghana in 1954 the year the Kumasi Central Hospital was constructed allows us a population approximately 6 million. We have a more firmer 6,043,448 for 1957, the year Ghana became independent.

Before all that, a 1948 population survey estimated the number of people in the Ashanti Region at 823,700 (and Kumasi, at about 78,500). Therefore, assuming the population of the Ashanti Region was 1,000,000 in 1954 when the 510-bed KATH was commissioned, we get a hospital bed to population ratio of 0.51. However, we would hazard that even though there were "30 government hospitals" in the Gold Coast in 1954 (most of them in the South), we could never improve on our 0.51 ratio for KATH because KATH actually served the Ashanti Region-plus.

Thus another Kwame Nkrumah miracle and "Sika Duro"!

During the period 1957 through 1966, from independence day to the year Kwame Nkrumah was overthrown, the number of hospital beds in Ghana increased dramatically. From a low 0.50 per 1,000 of the population for the entire country, it more than tripled to nearly 1.8 beds per 1,000 of the population.

Dance "Adowa-Dance" to 2013!

In 2013, forty-seven years after the overthrow of Kwame Nkrumah, there were just about 0.85 hospital beds per 1,000 of the population, indicating a gross failure to add to hospital bed capacity anywhere commensurate with the rate of increase in the population.

Further, while the number of doctors per 1,000 of the population in Ghana did not see a negative dive, it was still not inspiring given the promise to Ghana 47 years earlier. You see, by 1959, there were 0.5 doctors per 1,000 of the population. Six (6) short years later, in 1966, there were 0.8 doctors per 1,000 of the population, an increase of approximately 0.3 doctors per 1,000 of the population.

Next, "Abele-Dance" this One-Two time, to the other side of 2013!

During 2013, there were an estimated 0.1 doctors per 1,000 of the population, as well representing a failure to meaningfully add to the number of doctors in Ghana anywhere commensurate with the rate of increase in the population. In short, whereas during 1960-1966 the increase in doctors per 1,000 of the population was 0.3 those 6 years, the increase in the number of doctors per 1,000 of the population the entire 47 years after the overthrow of Nkrumah was 0.2.


DANQUAH-BUSIA-BAWUMIA-PRESTIGE-PROJECT FABRICATORS CAN'T ROPE-A-DOPE THAT:

Thus, was squandered the promise of development of/for Ghana, from North to South, East to West, and all places in-between Kumasi and the Ashanti Region. Such that even Mr. Muhammad Ali himself could not sugar-coat the dismal Ghana record with his famed "Rope-A-Dope" dive-and-jive. Simply, all the promise of development, progress, and happiness that Mr. Ali witnessed and experienced firsthand in 1964 just 10 years after the construction of KATH, were all squandered beginning with the actions of that Ankrah-NLC-Busia-NLM traitor bunch, and sundry absent-minded military dictators, among them Mr. Jerry "Accountability" Rawlings.

It is therefore in that light that we must faithfully evaluate the $10,192,000.00 seed investment in the 510-bed hospital in Kumasi in 1954, just 3 years before independence. If Nkrumah's CPP government had simply saved that money, by 2014, the income (principal, plus interest) would be just $80,353,000.00.

So now, being the economists that they are, let the Danquah-Busia-Bawumia-Prestige-Project gang tell us the economic value (in dollars or cedis, or whatever), of all the benefits that were accrued, and are still being enjoyed, over 57 years, by millions of patients by the existence of the KATH in Kumasi, in the Ashanti Region of Ghana. Next, let them add the thousands of direct and indirect employment and other economic opportunities created all those years. Finally, let them top all of that with the plant replacement value (PRV) of all those facilities still existing, including those roads, all facilities constructed during 1952-1954 as part of the $9.1 million project known as the KATH that was commissioned by in 1954 by Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, Leader, Government Business, Gold Coast.

How does $1,528,800,000.00 ($1.5 Billion) look and sound, if we simply multiplied the original investment by 150, just about 3 times the age of Ghana? Or, we could go nuclear economic-wise. Using the Table below, our "Prestige-Project-Fabricators" could utilize 1,569 (from 1995) as our baseline number of employees each one of the 50-odd years and estimate impact assuming “ripple effects.” That is, each KATH job each year supported about two extra jobs and every dollar spent by KATH (approximately $5.25 million in 1995) supported roughly $1.99 of additional economic activity every year, in the Ashanti Region and beyond.

Then, what value to add for the millions of lives saved and/or reconstructed in the Ashanti Region and all over Ghana, all those years?

How would all of that compare to the paltry $80,353,000.00 we would have earned if we had merely saved our money in a bank?

Or, maybe, our Prestige-Project-Fabricators would have preferred we gave them the those funds back in 1952. In that case, what would they have done with all that money, for all the good People in the Ashanti Region-plus?


Talking about prestige projects!


Give us a break, partners!!!


So it goes, Ghana!


NOTES/SOURCES (continued):

6. Ramesh Govindaraj et al. Hospital Autonomy in Ghana: The Experience of Korle Bu and Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospitals. Harvard School of Public Health and School of Public Health University of Ghana (1996).

7. Reportedly, there were 30 government hospitals three of which had nursing training schools, all with a total of 3,630 beds in the Gold Coast in 1954. In 1956, in the Ashanti "dependency", there were 11 hospitals, 19 health centers. and 41 midwifery clinics. As a result, we could conclude that the KATH and the "European Hospital that was re-sited at the "Kwadaso Military Quarters" must have been included in the count for the Ashanti "dependency". After faithful research, we do not have any numbers indicating how many hospital beds were still reserved for "Europeans", versus "Africans" who were the majority of the inhabitant, before independence and full control of government by the Convention People's Party (CPP).

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8. 1995 - Economic Factor Table* for Our Prestige-Project-Fabricators
Doctors----------- 176
Para-Medical---- 556
Nurse------------- 757
Gen Admin------ 28
Gen Service----- 52
Total------------- 1,569
*Let them assume for each one of those 50 years, plus the "ripple factor".

9. Human Resource Policies and Strategies for the Health Sector, 2007-2011,
KATH Staff Table Summary (1995).



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KATH/Gee Hospital Still Is Another Kwame Nkrumah Sika Duro (2.0)
(Final Paper with Graphic and Charts will be published shortly)
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