THOUGHTS ABOUT IFA IN THE DOUBLE TRACK EDUCATION SYSTEM

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"IS IT FEASIBLE FOR GIFTS OR IFA TO SURVIVE THE DOUBLE TRACK EDUCATION SYSTEM?''. 

The vision of the Government of Ghana to implement the new system in second cycle education came into effect with the admission of new Senior High School (SHS) students. The implementation of the double track system begins in some 400 Senior High Schools.

The major question remains, "how are we going to run the GIFTS in the double track system?" in the minds of health workers and other organizations involved.

Girls Iron Folate Tablet Supplementation (GIFTS), often referred to as Iron Folate Acid (IFA), is an initiative of United Nations International Children's Fund (UNICEF) and the Government of Ghana (GOG) to reduce the extremely alarming high rate of anaemia among adolescent girls in Ghana.

Of the two million girls aged between 15 and 19 years old in Ghana, around one million are anaemic. Being anaemic can cause dizziness, tiredness, and headaches. The repercussions can leave adolescent girls feeling unwell, not able to take part in physical activity, and ultimately it can set them back at school, reducing school performance and sometimes causing girls to drop out of school.
Anaemia’s long-term negative effects on the health and wellbeing of adolescent girls, underline the need for systematic action at all levels to ensure girls’ futures are not compromised.
The first phase of the programme started in four of the ten regions with a potential for scale-up depending on availability of funding. In the four regions, the programme is expected to reach 360,000 girls in junior and senior high schools, vocational and training institutions and 600,000 girls who are not in these institutions or out of school.
The answers to these questions are not rocketed science calculations but are just within our capabilities. All stakeholders must be involved in order for the programme to cover those in school and those out of school. The answers are not far from what is stated in the GIFTS project outline document. 
Stated below are some of the strategies that some health workers in North-Dayi District deliberated on to use to improve and sustain the programme within the double track system:
  1. Re-sensitize stakeholders especially community leaders and heads of institutions within the communities.
  2. Re-sensitize the communities during community social gatherings like feasts, community durbars, etc.
  3. Re-orient and train teachers in both the first and second categories to their full capabilities to handle the programme in schools.
  4. Supply each track system with their respective IFA registers, tally or inventory control cards, paper files and semester reporting forms since students in the first category are different from the students in the second category.
  5. All qualified individuals in category 2 waiting to report to school for the first time in their admission should be covered in the programme under OUT-OF-SCHOOL.
  6. All qualified students enrolled on IN-SCHOOL who have finished their semester should be given the supplements to take home to continue the course and they should be monitored by parents. Another school of thought said since they have finished their semester and coming home, they should be enrolled onto OUT-OF-SCHOOL. This decision lies with policymakers within Ghana Health Service (GHS) and the donors.

In order to sustain this programme through the above-stated strategies, funds must be made available to run the programme smoothly. This is what some staffs in North-Dayi District thought of, and they believe it will not be that different from the three other regions undertaking the IFA programme.

References
(2017, October 31). Retrieved from Gh.one: http://gh.one.un.org/content/unct/ghana/en/home/media-centre/news-and-press-releases/GIFTS-for-adolescent-girls-in-Ghana.html
(2017). Retrieved from Ghana Business.com: https://www.businessghana.com/site/news/general/169112/Girls-Iron-Folate-Tablet-Supplementary-programme-registers-3-200-in-2017


Location: Vakpo, Ghana

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