Completeness of Health Declaration Reports during COVID-19 Pandemic in Ghana: Evidence from Travellers’ Surveillance Data, 2020

Introduction: Surveillance data completeness and timeliness is critical for effective outbreak response notably in the advent of increasing of infectious diseases of pandemic proportions. Ghana enhanced screening at Points of Entry by intensifying the usage of health declaration forms in response to the emergence of the global threat of COVID-19. Here, we assess the completeness of health declaration form information submitted by travellers and determine predictors of data completeness and demographic variables as a measure to improve data quality at Points of Entry.

Methods: A retrospective cross-sectional study was employed and involved collection of information (age, sex, date of arrival) from the health declaration forms submitted by travellers between the period of March 7-19, 2020 at Ghana’s International Airport. Flights which harboured travellers infected with COVID-19 virus and exhibited clinical symptoms prior to or within 2 days from the arrival date were included in the analysis. Descriptive analyses were expressed in the form of frequencies and percentages. Association and Regression tests using STATA statistical Package were carried out between travellers’ age, sex, nationality, arrival date and form completeness.

Results: A total of 2,374 travellers from 7 flights were included in the study for the period under review. Travellers provided 82.9% and 80.6% complete basic contact and critical information respectively with significant associations between the completeness of travellers’ basic contact and critical information and the travellers’ age, nationality, and arrival date. Travellers’ age, nationality, and date of arrival were found to be strong predictors of completeness of contact and critical information on the health declaration form with younger age categories (<35years) and local nationals were more likely to provide complete health information than older and foreign nationals

Conclusion: Percentage completeness of travellers’ health information was appreciable with older persons and foreign nationals less likely to provide incomplete health information. We suggest that efforts to enhance data capture at Points of Entry should prioritize foreign nationals and the aged. Port Health Officials should endeavour to assist/guide foreign nationals and the aged to entirely fill out health declaration forms as a measure to enhance quality and completeness of data for effective disease surveillance.