The Country of Ghana
According to the CIA World Fact book, Ghana on the continent of Africa was “the first sub-Saharan country in colonial Africa to gain its independence” in 1957. Even though Ghana’s per capita output doubles that of the poorest countries in West Africa, the country remains heavily dependent on financial and technical assistance.
In 2002 Ghana qualified for debt relief under the Heavily Indebted Poor Country program and the Multilateral Debt Relief Initiative, which took effect in 2006. It was estimated in 2000 by the CIA that 11% of the population was unemployed while in 2007 it was estimated by the CIA that 28.5% live below the poverty line. Because of the high levels of poverty, many parents cannot afford to send their children to school. According to UNICEF, acute malnutrition is endemic in Ghana with many parents unable to feed their children. Many live on less than one meal a day.
According to the CIA’s World Fact book Ghana’s population of 23,832,495 is dying at a rate of 9.24 deaths for every 1,000 of the population every year, estimated in 2009, and 21,000 of those annual deaths are due to HIV/AIDS, estimated in 2007. Infants are dying at a rate of 51.09 for every 1,000 live births. They are at very high risk for bacterial and protozoal diarrhea, hepatitis A, typhoid fever, malaria, schistosomasis, meningococcal meningitis, and rabies. The life expectancy of a Ghanaian is only 59.85 years.