The Department of Communications and Digital Technologies (DCDT), in collaboration with the Department of Health (DOH), has established partnerships with Internet service providers and local telecoms operators to provide broadband Internet connectivity to 26 COVID-19 healthcare centres across the country.
The initiative is part of the departments’ mission to provide fast broadband connectivity to 480 hospitals and clinics nationwide.
In March, the DOH announced it would make provision to establish over 1 600 emergency field hospitals and quarantine sites to help alleviate the burden of COVID-19 patients at clinics and hospitals across the country.
The DOH also signed an unprecedented partnership deal for private hospital groups to collaborate with public hospitals to offer treatment, investigatory and practitioner services to patients for a fixed fee.
The broadband project, which provides Internet speeds of above 10Mbps, has been installed at Siyabuswa Mobile Clinic, Balgowan Clinic, Bambisana Hospital, Frere Hospital, Kwazenzele Clinic and Belfast Clinic, among others.
It will enable quick and effective consultations, allow remote health facilities to transfer patient files and carry out statistical reporting and medical analysis functions, according to DCDT.
It will also support the critical health centres in enhancing the overall patient experience of quality healthcare, access to information and reliability.
“This partnership, brokered by DCDT minister Stella Ndabeni-Abrahams, was in response to the directions gazetted in March and an effort to assist government in meeting the key objective of slowing the spread of the coronavirus,” says the DCDT.
“In response to this, regulatory body Independent Communications Authority of South Africa also assigned temporary radio frequency spectrum to mobile network operators. This will ensure citizens are able to access ICT services, government programmes and have the necessary information to protect themselves against this pandemic.”
Last month, local private healthcare facilities told ITWeb they have boosted their digital transformation initiatives by leveraging emerging technologies to improve efficiency and the quality of care delivered in the fight against COVID-19.
Germ-destroying robots, advanced ventilators and remote working technologies have been deployed by some hospitals to aid the fight against the deadly virus.
As part of government’s COVID-19 interventions, the DCDT says it is working with the departments of basic and higher education, in partnership with mobile network operators and Internet service providers, to provide free Internet services.
Together, the organisations have approved hundreds of local Web sites to be zero-rated for educational purposes.
“Increased access to information is at the heart of department directions; the realities of inequality are such that not everyone can simply move online.
“All successful licensees for temporary IMT spectrum assignments are required to support and create virtual teaching and classrooms as determined by the department, in alignment with the Department of Basic Education,” says Ndabeni-Abrahams.
Meanwhile, the DCDT says it has entered into a memorandum of understanding with the Department of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs to facilitate the temporary rapid deployment of electronic communications and facilities within municipalities across the country.
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