It will be recalled the libraries were officially closed to the public on the 16th of March 2020 as a result of the outbreak of the novel corona virus. Ghana first recorded its first two cases of the novel corona virus on the 12th of March 2020, this triggered the announcement by the president banning public gathering of all sorts including, schools, libraries, churches, mosques among others. The statistics of the COVID 19 as at today stands at; total confirmed cases 44, 658, recoveries rate is 43, 478 and death rate is 276.
The libraries resumed operating in the month of August.The COVID 19 preventives measures outline by the health experts were put in place and adhere to in all the libraries, thankful in our part of the country, I mean the Upper East Region, the pandemic have not severely affected the region that much, in the president last address to the nation on the COVID 19 update, the Upper East Region among other few regions were declared free from the virus by the president. Patronage to the respective libraries for the month were quite good but not with the usual high numbers used to be recorded; this was due to the social distancing protocol among others. Most of the patrons were young adults and adult’s readers at the upper primary, junior high, senior high and tertiary students. Most the books read were texts books, notes taking from school and story books. The activities during the month were mostly individual reading and clean up exercise of the libraries and its premises. Touring the respective libraries for monitoring and supervision, most of the patrons agreed that the corona pandemic have brought a lot of changes to many things and even their way of thinking. They never imagine for once that an outbreak of a disease now known as the COVID 19 could break out in one country (China) and spread very rapidly across the globe. But be that as it may, COVID 19 has come; a lot of lives have been lost across the globe forcing public gatherings including their libraries to be closed down. It is our hope that our health experts around the world would work hard in coming out with a vaccine for the virus. In conclusion, CESRUD/FAVL Ghana libraries have since resumed, and libraries activities of reading is picking up well. Patrons are happy that after a long time of being in their houses, they can now once again meet at the respective libraries to read books and perhaps meet with friends and school mates again. On Gowrie-Kunkua Library, the roofing work is still ongoing and is expected to be done soon.
