Prince Adjei - Guy Gee
By: Prince Adjei – Guy Gee
Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital (KATH) is more than a hospital. Located in Kumasi, the capital of the Ashanti Region with a population of over 5.4 million, it is the second-largest teaching hospital in Ghana.
The geographical location of this 1,200-bed facility, the road network, and the unique commercial position of Kumasi makes it accessible to all the remaining fifteen regions of Ghana, especially those that share boundaries with Ashanti – Bono, Ahafo, Western North, Central, Eastern and parts of Northern Region. On any given day, KATH is not just treating Kumasi; it is treating Ghana.
But today, the pride of Asanteman is struggling to breathe.
When The Healers Have No Tools
Visit KATH and you will see the dedication of our doctors, nurses and supporting staff. They are working under extreme pressure. The problem is not their commitment; it is what they have to work with.
The challenges are visible:
– Obsolete and broken-down equipment
– Lack of basic working tools and consumables
– An alarming doctor-to-patient and nurse-to-patient ratio. One doctor is forced to attend to tens of critically ill patients at once. Monitoring becomes difficult, care becomes rushed, and patients suffer.
A hospital of this magnitude cannot function effectively under these conditions.
My Personal Pain: Five Dialysis Machines for a Whole KATH
This is no longer statistics for me. It is personal.
A whole Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital has only five dialysis machines, and as of my last visit, four of them were malfunctioning.
A brother, by name Yaw Adomako Afful, needed emergency dialysis to live. Instead of being treated, he was discharged from KATH for lack of a functioning dialysis machine and asked to go and find a private dialysis center in Sofoline in Kumasi for treatment. The delay, the cost, and the stress – we lost him just a week ago, Tuesday, 15th September, 2026.
How many more families must go through this? How can Ghana’s second-largest referral hospital refer its own patients to a private facility in Sofoline for a life-saving procedure because its own machines are not working?
A Call to Action, Not Politics
It is high time the Government, the Ministry of Health, the management of KATH, the Ghana Health Service and all stakeholders took critical notice. KATH needs urgent retooling, expansion of its dialysis and intensive care units, and recruitment and retention of more health professionals.
We need to make KATH effective, efficient, and reliable again to save the lives of the poor patients who cannot afford private hospitals.
But government alone cannot do it.
I am calling on churches, mosques, religious leaders, traditional leaders led by Otumfuo Osei Tutu II, philanthropists, donors, corporate bodies, individuals in Kumasi and its environs, and Ghanaians at large to come to the aid of KATH. A bed, a monitor, a dialysis machine, a renovation of a ward – every contribution counts.
KATH saved us yesterday. Let us save KATH today.
Let us all raise our voices for it to be heard.
You see something, you say something.
We are building a country and I urge that this cry should not be politicized. This is not about NDC or NPP. This is about human life. This is about our mothers, fathers, brothers and sisters who will need KATH tomorrow.
Let us act now.
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