Vivian Kumah has been the lead nurse in charge of the community health planning and service centre at Gambia No 1 for about four and half years – and getting water had been a problem for almost the whole of that time.

Some of the cleanest and smartest toilets in the whole Bongo district are found at Foe Community Health and Planning Services (CHPS). This community health post serves more than 2,280 people in four communities across an area stretching up to the border with Burkina Faso.

Pure water has become a powerful selling point for communities in the Wassa East district of Ghana, proving that people will indeed pay for water if they can be sure it is safe. Four years ago (2016), a little over half of the population of Wassa East (56%) in the Western Region had access to safe water, a situation the Wassa East Chief Executive, Hon. Wilson Arthur, described as “scary”.

IRC Ghana, an international think-and-do tank that works with governments, NGOs, businesses and people around the world to find long-term solutions to the global crisis in water, sanitation and hygiene services and integrated water resources management (IWRM) is looking for a dynamic, well organized and result-oriented person to fill the position of: Program Officer WASH.

As part of the war against COVID-19, Ghana has taken several actions: President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo established a coronavirus fund to alleviate hardship and donated three months of his own salary, while a separate 1.2 billion Ghanaian cedi (over $205 million) Coronavirus Alleviation Programme includes funds to pay for water bills for all Ghanaians for three months — from April to June — and to provide water tanker services to vulnerable communities.

On Thursday May 7, 2020, the Coalition of NGOs in Water and Sanitation (CONIWAS) in collaboration with the Resource Centre Network (RCN) and through the Watershed programme organized a webinar under the RCN National Level Alliance Platform (NLLAP) to discuss the role and response of Ghana’s Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) in the wake of the unfolding reality of Covid-19.

Every now and again the rich world has its nose rubbed in the true meaning of poverty. The coronavirus pandemic is but the latest example. We need to make sure it's the last. As I write, aid agencies around the world are trying to ramp up their reaction to COVID-19. Yet my fear is that all this frenetic activity may do little more than underline the brutal reality that there is really not a lot we can do at short notice. Or rather, that the meaningful work we can do, of reinforcing basic public health messaging and measures, is going to seem woefully inadequate.

Prominent thinkers urge continent's leaders to use coronavirus pandemic crisis as opportunity to spur 'radical change

Due to the Covid-19 pandemic affecting the whole world, the Resource Centre Network (RCN) has postponed all face-face NLLAP meetings until advised otherwise. To cope with this and keep our community active, the RCN has launched an online learning platform to keep the doors of sharing and learning open in these unprecedented times.

The Ghana Standards Authority (GSA) has granted a product certification for the solar powered automated hand washing machine invented by a Ghanaian to encourage safe hand-washing practices. The product, manufactured by Mr Richard Kwarteng, a resident of Kumasi in the Ashanti Region, enables individuals to wash their hands under running water without touching the tap or knob of the water receptacle