Primary healthcare professionals across the country are attending a health entrepreneurship workshop by the Africa Higher Education Health Collaborative, KNUST in partnership with Mastercard Foundation in Kumasi.

The 60 recipients selected from all the 16 regions constitute the inaugural cohort.

The 10-day event under the auspices of the Health Entrepreneurship pillar of the Collaborative aims to empower professionals in nurturing entrepreneurial mindset to develop robust health initiatives in Ghana.

The pillar lead, Prof. Wilberforce Owusu-Ansah said at the opening ceremony: “We need a new paradigm shift in terms of our thinking. What we have is a fixed mindset. What is required of us here is a growth mindset.

”Not every single person here will end up generating ideas to run a business, what we are expecting of you is mindset change, attitudinal change so that you can be able think creatively and innovatively and also be more entrepreneurial.”

The Principal Investigator of the project, Prof. Ellis Owusu-Dabo also underscored the importance of the ownership mentality in thriving businesses.

He fingered the lack of it to the collapse of many businesses in the country.

“Before you start thinking entrepreneurial, you must first own it. When you own it means you’re ready to take risks. When you own it, it means you’re ready to say, “my DNA in this job.” So, when it’s going bad, you have the eye to spot it and see that it’s going bad.

“We start something beautifully and after 2, 3, 4, 5 years, it starts declining. The reason is that we don’t have ownership of the job that we do,” he admonished.

Dr. Isaac Tweneboah Kodua, the lead facilitator, guaranteed participants that the coursework would be practical, aiming to enhance their comprehension of concepts.

The primary objective of the Africa Higher Education Health Collaborative is to build and strengthen the capacity of Health care students and professionals to meet growing demand for Primary Health Care in Ghana.