Eustace Akwei - Misplaced Pages

Ghanaian medical doctor

Eustace Akwei (3 December 1913 – ?) was a Ghanaian medical doctor. He was the first Ghanaian to be appointed Chief Medical Officer in the Gold Coast.

Early life

Akwei was born on 3 December 1913. He was educated at Achimota School in Accra and at Edinburgh University.

Eustace Akwei worked as a public health physician in the Gold Coast. He was the first native to work with Dr G. T. Saunders, who was the first specialist epidemiologist and was instrumental in the control of trypanosomiasis in the country. He was a former Rockefeller Travelling Fellow and later became the first Ghanaian to be appointed Chief Medical Officer to the Ministry of Health in the Gold Coast in 1955. He was one of the prominent doctors present at the inauguration of the Ghana Medical Association in 1958. He was removed from his chief medic role in 1959 by Kwame Nkrumah, who was at the time the Prime Minister of Ghana. He subsequently joined the World Health Organization and was based in Brazzaville in the Republic of the Congo. After the coup d'état in 1966, he was reappointed Chief Medical Officer by the new National Liberation Council (NLC) military government which replaced the ruling Nkrumah government.

In 1966, Akwei was appointed Commissioner for Health by the NLC military government, a position he held until the return of democratic rule in 1969.

^ Ghana Today. 1967.
New Ghana. 1966. p. 7.
^ Ashitey, Gilford A. (1994). Disease Control in Ghana (PDF). Accra: Ghana Universities Press. p. 11. ISBN 9964301960.
"Negro Appointed Chief Medic in Gold Coast". JET. 8 (15): 12. 18 August 1955. Retrieved 30 October 2019.
"BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GHANA MEDICAL ASSOCIATION". Official website. Ghana Medical Association. Retrieved 30 October 2019.
Reinhardt, Bob H. (30 September 2015). The End of a Global Pox: America and the Eradication of Smallpox in the Cold War Era (1st ed.). University North Carolina Pr. pp. 96–97. ISBN 978-1469624099. Retrieved 30 October 2019.
Steinberg, S. H., ed. (1968). The Statesman's Year-Book 1968–69: The One-Volume ENCYCLOPAEDIA of all nations. London: Macmillan. p. 445. ISBN 9780230270978. Retrieved 30 October 2019.