The Ghana Registered Nurses and Midwifery Association (GRNMA) has revealed that 168 of its members have tested positive for coronavirus across the country.

According to the Association’s General Secretary, eight of them have recovered whilst one has succumbed to the virus.

David Tenkorang-Twum who was speaking on Joy FM’s Top Story Friday, also added that several nurses and midwives have been exposed and are currently under mandatory quarantine.

He described the situation as worrying since the health workers are the primary human resources assisting the country to combat the virus.

According to Mr Tenkorang-Twum, the rise of infection amongst health workers can be attributed to ineffective contact tracing.

He explained that, since contact tracing is not thoroughly carried out, people report to various hospitals with the disease, thereby exposing and infecting health workers and other patients at the hospital.

“The figures keep rising and we are not surprised because they [authorities] are not listening to us. But, until we change the narrative or the way we manage the patients, we are going to have a lot of nurses, doctors, and other supporting staff getting infected.

“Because people are admitted into the wards as an ordinary cases, but before you say jack, it turns Covid," he said.

He, therefore, suggested that government reviews the management of the virus so that hospitals would have holding areas for suspected cases as patients await their results.

The General Secretary also appealed for nursing mothers and pregnant nurses and midwives to be granted indefinite leave.

For him, it will be dangerous to expose pregnant health workers to the deadly virus.

“There are more nurses and midwives out there. We have several batches that have not been employed; the 2018 & 2019, diploma and degree nurses who are at home.

“So we can employ these nurses to augment the team so that those who have served all these years and are now pregnant can be relieved of their duties for now,” he recommended.