Hundreds of residents of Derby Avenue and its surrounding areas in Accra were screened Saturday for various sicknesses.
The exercise is part of activities listed by the local organizing committee of the Sacred Heart Parish, to commemorate the 125th anniversary of Catholicism in the Archdiocese of Accra.
Speaking during the exercise, Parish priest of the Parish, the first Catholic Church to be established in Accra, Rev Father Clement Wilson said the exercise was to ensure that the church is interested in the holistic wellbeing of not just its members but the communities they find themselves in as a whole.
“The church is there for the people’s spiritual needs but not only that we have to also take care of their physical needs. So we thought that it will be good for us to organize this to help the locality, not only the parishioners but to help the community,” he said.
“We are not charging anything, we doing eye, we are doing dental, we are checking their blood pressure we are also checking breast cancer. We have doctors and nurses who are doing that,” he added.
According to Rev. Father Wilson, the church was targeting some 1000 people and was hoping to undertake the exercise more frequently
Some beneficiaries of the exercise who spoke to Starr News lauded the church for the initiative. “When I came my blood sample was taken and some tests run on it. Then I went for a dental examination as well as a breast cancer screening. The church has really done well. I am grateful and wish they could do this more often,” a beneficiary said.
The 125th anniversary of the Archdiocese of Accra was launched in September last year and is being marked with a year-long series of activities.
Source: Ghana/Starrfmonline.com/103.5FM/Naa Dedei Tettey
