Coronavirus Scare Arrivers at Kotoka Not Cooperating With Scans

Passengers touching down at the Kotoka International Airport in Accra are not keenly cooperating with health officials in the crucial exercise of screening them for the deadly coronavirus that is ravaging China and other parts of the world.
 
Accra based 3FM reports that some of these passengers from abroad ignore requirements for them to fill health declaration forms upon touchdown at Kotoka.
 
Esi Benewa Otu, Senior Health Correspondent with TV 3 this afternoon gave an on-the-beat report from Kotoka that showed that Ghanaian health officials are having a tough time getting passengers who disembark to go through the scanning process even though the authorities have set up thermal scanners and a holding area as part of emergency response.
 
“…for now what I can say at the airport is that all these things have been put in place but another concern is that most of the people (are not cooperating), and I observed it myself. So you fill the health declaration form before you even get to where the screening proper is done, but most people do not do it and when the health officials try to tell them to do it, you know, attitude and all those things come in,” she reported.
 
Given that even the temperature scanners cannot detect carriers of the virus who are not showing full-blown symptoms, the refusal by those arriving into the country to comply with the scanning process only adds to the danger of possible invasion by the virus.
 
Ms Benewa, in her report, cites an example of one woman who had virtually quarrelled with officials after throwing a temper tantrum over request that she signs a health declaration form.
 
The deadly coronavirus has killed at least 170 in China alone, two weeks after its outbreak and has so far spread to 15 countries. There is no known cure for the disease whose symptoms are flu-like.
 
Meanwhile, in addition to the health declaration form, the government has also deployed thermal scanners to all entry points into the country, including Kotoka and the various ports.
 
The thermal scanners however operate only on the principle of detection of high temperatures. Once a subject who passes through the scanner registers a temperature of 37.5 degrees Celsius and above, they are isolated and led to a holding area. This does not mean that they are automatically infected though.
 
After they are isolated, they are led away from the arrival hall through an exit in the holding area to emergency medical facilities to be tested for the coronavirus.
 
So far, no case has been reported.