Tema-Ghana, Nov. 29, GNA – Labour Unions have been urged to include medical screening in their collective bargaining agreement (CBA) to enable them to access regular health screenings for good health.
Dr. Isaac Selase Alormele, Managing Director of Eyeroom Optical Center, Zimbabwe, who made the call, explained that the medical screening policy should make it mandatory for an annual staff health screening to help safeguard the health of workers.
He said most workers often do not get time from their busy schedules to seek medical care while in active service so such a policy would be beneficial to them.
Speaking at the Ghana News Agency Tema Regional Office and Ghana Optometric Association “GNA-GOA My Eyes! My Vision! campaign platform in Tema, Dr. Alormele called for reforms to ensure that health needs of staff were captured in any negotiations between employers and employees.
The fortnight initiative is a collaborative public education advocacy campaign to promote the need for people to access eye care and also to draw attention to vision health.
The GNA-GOA: My Eyes! My Vision! The initiative also seeks to challenge the public and policymakers to focus on vision as a health issue, which forms a critical component of mankind’s well-being but is often neglected.
Dr. Alormele charged corporate entities and employers to classify annual staff health screening as part of medical screening policy as a Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR).
He added that CSR activities must start from within the companies instead of always concentrating on others.
He said companies in Zimbabwe were mandated to provide their workers with health screening, religiously done mostly in October every year, saying companies in Ghana must emulate such good policies.
Dr. Alormele said during such screening, different health professionals were put together to do a thorough check on the workers, adding that such checks would enable early detection of sicknesses, and referral for medical care when needed.
He said apart from securing the health of workers, it would also benefit the companies as they would have healthy people to drive productivity and be legally protected from being liable for the health conditions of workers.
He advised the public to take their health screening seriously saying eye screening, for instance, must be done at least at 18-month intervals to help detect any defects and other sicknesses early.
Dr. Kwame Oben-Nyarko, GOA Public Relations Officer, on his part reiterated the need for regular eye checks noting that the eye was a major tool for diagnoses.
He said most diagnoses were picked up from eye screening and referrals made.
Dr. Oben-Nyarko, who is also the Chief Executive Officer of Third Eye and Vision Centrre, was speaking on Computer Vision Syndrome, and added that signs of sicknesses including diabetes, HIV, liver problems, infections, and aneamia among others could be diagnosed from the eyes.
Mr. Francis Ameyibor, Ghana News Agency Tema Regional Manager, emphasized that the health of workers had a comparative influence on productive and expensive medical bills.
He said, “your medical bill should tell you the health status of your staff, it is, therefore, paramount for employers to consider the annual mandatory health screening exercise paid for by the employer.”
