Mobile tech tracks malaria outbreaks

The United Nations, HP and non-profit Positive Innovation for the Next Generation (Ping) have created an initiative that uses mobile health monitoring technology to combat malaria outbreaks, reports Wireless Week.

The programme equips healthcare workers in Botswana with Palm Pre 2 smartphones to collect malaria data, notify the Ministry of Health about an outbreak and tag both data and disease surveillance information with a GPS coordinate.

Venture Beat says HP is providing mobile equipment to health workers, and is training them how to report outbreaks of disease such as malaria.

In partnership with the Clinton Health Access Initiative and mobile network provider, Mascom, HP collects the data from the smartphones and organises it in a database with navigation coordinates and other details.

The programme has been in a pilot phase for a year and is the largest mobile health pilot in Botswana. Between 700 and 1 000 health workers have the mobile phones. Future programmes could be rolled out across Africa.

Mobile Health News reveals that Katy Digovich, Ping director of operations, says: “We're focused on addressing health and development problems by not only using technology in an innovative way, but also by creating more problem solvers in the local population.

“By combining our socially-active core with innovation and business acumen from HP, and the scale of government organisations, we can achieve the greatest opportunity for lasting social change.”