The Chairman of the National Media Commission (NMC), Mr Kwasi Gyan-Apenteng, has called for the use of local resources to solve health problems confronting the country.
Speaking at the launch of a locally manufactured medicine said to cure HIV/AIDS at the Centre of Awareness (COA) in Accra last Wednesday, Mr Gyan-Apenteng noted that the government spent billions of cedis every year to import medical supplies to solve health problems in the country.
The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of COA, Dr Samuel Ato Duncan, said the decision to research and develop a cure for HIV and AIDS was taken at the launch of the 2015 global peace mission and eradication of HIV and AIDS programme.
He said the medicine, COA 72, hadbeen manufactured to cure a disease that had remained incurable since it was discovered in 1989.
The COA 72
Speaking on the theme: “Cure for HIV/AIDS, our major concern,” Dr Duncan said the COA, through a pilot scientific research, came up with a formula and proceeded to South Africa to develop an agent to fight the disease.
“It is a question of national pride for us that we have developed this potential cure for this dreadful global disease here in Ghana,” he said.
According to him,“the initiative by COA has shown clearly that we do not need to import ideas and solutions from elsewhere when it can be done here in Ghana.”
He said the efficacy of COA 72 had been tested by the Centre for Scientific Research into Plant Medicine at Akuapem Mampong in the Eastern Region and the Noguchi Memorial Institute for Medical Research (NMIMR) at Legon, in Accra.
How it works
Dr Duncan said the medicine was first tested in a test tube and later an animal and then on human beings.
He stated that the medicine, COA 72, worked in three days, equivalent to 72 hours, hence, the name.
He explained that in the first 12 hours, it clears viruses in an HIV patient but the patients must continue with medication, adding that the hidden virus within the human would be cleared in five days after an intravenous administration.
Dr. Duncan, therefore, called on the government and stakeholders to recognise the potential of COA
Support for COA
Miss Bandile Mdlalos from South Africa, in a testimony, claimed that she had been cured after taking the COA 72, adding that there was hope for people with HIV.
For his part, the Deputy Chief of Staff, Mr Jonny Osei Kofi, lauded the initiative by the COA to develop a formula and encouraged Dr Duncan to work harder to get the medicine widely recognised.
He pledged his commitment to help the COA in any way to bring comfort and peace to people living with HIV.
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