The civil registration authority responsible for birth and death registration is the National Office of the Births and Deaths Registry, headed by a Registrar of Births and Deaths. This office resides under the Ministry of Local Government, Chieftaincy and Religious Affairs. The key law on civil registration is the Registration of Births and Deaths Act 2020. Primary civil registration offices are at district level, with districts coinciding with Ghana’s local government units. District offices provide information on births, fetal deaths and deaths to regional offices, which are located in all the regional capitals. The regional offices collect and collate the information for transmission to the National Births and Deaths Registry. Separate registers of all births, fetal deaths and deaths that occur in Ghana are kept at district and national levels. 

The District Assembly in each District, which is composed of a mixture of elected persons and persons appointed by the President, must keep and maintain a community population register which is used as demographic data for development planning in the district. These community registers also serve as reference documents for the official registration of births and deaths. 

In terms of the Registration of Births and Deaths Act, birth registration in Ghana is universal, compulsory, and free if completed within the prescribed time period of 12 months. Ghana’s Children’s Act also gives children a specific right to be registered after birth.

There is a two-step process for births that occur in a hearth facility or under the supervision of a traditional birth attendant. The head of the health facility or the traditional birth attendant is required to give notification of the birth directly to the relevant District Registrar within seven days of its occurrence. The primary informants for the registration of births in every case, regardless of the place of birth, are the mother, the father or both parents. The District Registrar may enter the name of a person as the father of the child only at the joint request of the mother and the person claiming to be the father of the child (or where the mother of the child is dead, with the sworn written consent of the mother’s family). 

Death registration is governed by the Registration of Births and Deaths Act 2020 and is universal, free and compulsory.  Like birth registrations, there is a two-step registration process for deaths that occur in a health facility, or where the body is brought to a health facility. The medical practitioner or health practitioner in charge of the health facility must record the death and notify the District Registrar of the death within 7 days of its occurrence. There is a separate requirement for certain persons to furnish the particulars of death to the District Registrar regardless of the place of death, and the primary informant is the nearest relative of the deceased present at the time of death or in attendance at the last illness of the deceased. Timely death registration must take place within 10 days after the death occurred. 

Disposal of a body requires a burial permit which is issued upon registration of the death, and which must be endorsed and returned to the District Registrar by the owner or manager of the burial ground or other disposal facility. 

Medical certification of causes of death is generally covered by the Registration of Births and Deaths Act, 2020. A medical practitioner who was in attendance during the illness of the deceased must issue a medical certificate that states the cause of death to the person who is providing the particulars of the death to the District Registrar. The person who receives the medical certificate on the cause of death must submit the certificate to the District Registrar, who must then register the particulars of the deceased in the register of deaths.

If a Coroner holds an inquiry in respect of a dead body, the Coroner must complete and sign a certificate that states the cause of the death. The Coroner may direct a registered medical practitioner to make a post-mortem examination of the body or to conduct analyses, tests or other special examinations of any part of the body or any substance or thing, for the purpose of discovering the cause of death. The recipient of the Coroner’s certificate on cause of death must submit it to the District Registrar, who will register the particulars of the deceased in the register of deaths. In addition, if the Coroner decides that no formal enquiry (inquest) need be held, the Coroner must provide the Registrar of Births and Deaths with a certificate on the cause of death within seven days of the decision to dispense with the inquiry. If a formal inquiry is held, the Coroner must provide the Registrar with this certificate to the Registrar within seven days of its conclusion.

A death certificate does not include any information on the cause of death. 

The  Registration of Births and Deaths Act, 2020 provides for the registration of all “foetal deaths” which are defined as “death before the complete expulsion or extraction from the mother of a baby irrespective of the duration of pregnancy, which does not breathe or show any other evidence of life like the beating of the heart, pulsation of the umbilical cord or definite movement of voluntary muscles”. The Registrar and the District Registrars are charged to keep separate registers of births, fetal deaths and deaths.

The same persons who have a legal duty to register a birth have a duty to register a fetal death with the District Registrar, with the primary informants being the mother, the father or both parents. The registration must include confirmation of the fetal death in the form of a written certificate signed by a registered medical practitioner or midwife who was in attendance when the fetal death occurred, or who has examined the fetus. Alternatively, the confirmation can be a declaration to the effect that no medical certificate can be provided because no registered medical practitioner or midwife was present at the occurrence of the fetal death or has examined the fetus. If the District Registrar is satisfied with the certificate or the declaration provided to confirm the fetal death, the District Registrar must register the fetal death and issue a burial permit for the purpose of burial or other disposition of the body. There are no fees for the registration of fetal deaths. 

Ghana’s Statistical Service Act 2018 establishes the Statistical Service, an independent national agency responsible for providing quality, relevant, accurate and timely statistical information for the purpose of national development. It is headed by the Government Statistician, who is appointed by the President. The Government Statistician is mandated to collect, compile, analyze, abstract, publish and disseminate statistics in relation to a wide range of matters, one of which is “vital occurrences including births, deaths and marriages”.

The Registration of Births and Deaths Regulations require the national Registrar to forward to the Government Statistician a report of each birth, fetal death and death registered in the country but sets out no timeframe for transmission of this data. There is no provision for anonymization of civil registration data that is shared with the Statistical Service, however, the Statistical Service Act generally prohibits a member of the Service from publishing or revealing any  information that identifies a specific person to a third party except with the prior written consent of the person in question – with an exception to this rule for information transmitted by the Government Statistician to the Office of the President, a Ministry, Department or Agency for statistical purposes.