App/Software

Muhamed Bizimana of CARE in the U.S. will establish an electronic system to group urban slum households and connect them with sanitation services and financing options to reduce unsafe dumping of human waste in urban Cote D’Ivoire cities. Sixty percent of urban households in Cote D’Ivoire have unsafe sanitation systems – septic tanks improperly emptied, public dumping of human waste, and open defecation – which causes a serious health threat and limits economic development. A goal has been set for all households to have access to clean drinking water and sanitation by 2030.

Jignesh Patel of the Indian Institute of Technology Hyderabad in India will increase vaccination coverage among low-income urban populations in India by designing a mobile vaccine service including a smartphone-based management application that provides customized vaccinations at homes and schools and at lower cost. Vaccination offers excellent protection against many diseases, however coverage is low among low-income populations in urban centers: immunization at private clinics is unaffordable, and public clinics have longer wait times leading to lost wages.

Rumi Chunara of New York University in the U.S. will collect data from mobile phones of healthcare workers to develop algorithms that will help prioritize healthcare resources to increase vaccine coverage in Punjab, Pakistan. Immunization is one of the most cost-effective and successful public health strategies and is estimated to prevent up to three million deaths each year. Still, many rural areas of low- and middle-income countries have an under-vaccinated population due to a lack of formal education and awareness of the importance of vaccinations.

Paul Namwanja of the Community Health Centre, Busabala in Uganda will implement mobile technology for village health teams to monitor households and childhood vaccinations on remote islands in Uganda and to establish public-private partnerships with community health workers and boat owners to improve vaccine coverage. Vaccination rates on Ugandan islands are significantly lower than the national level because of unreliable transportation to access mainland healthcare centers; island residents rely on commercial fishing boats to travel and face long wait times for healthcare service.

Subhash Chandir, Danya Arif, and Ali Habib of IRD Global in Singapore will develop a text-based immunization chatbot that uses artificial intelligence (AI) and natural language processing to provide vaccine education and practical information to caregivers to improve vaccine coverage in Pakistan. Although free clinics exist, many children remain incompletely vaccinated because caregivers are unaware of the importance of immunization and uninformed about clinic locations and schedules.

Caroline Kabaria of the African Population & Health Research Center in Kenya will use geographic information systems (GIS) to map the location of health facilities and community health volunteers in Kenya to identify particularly marginalized slum populations that need better access to health services such as vaccinations. Nairobi and Kisumu contain over 100 slums where residents live in dense and unsanitary conditions. The specific health needs of these residents are difficult to assess from national statistics that often exclude them.

Mustafa Naseem of the University of Michigan in the U.S. will create an android application to present digital immunization and performance data from front-line health workers to their medical supervisors to improve vaccination coverage in Pakistan. Polio is a vaccine-preventable disease, eradicated in much of the world yet endemic in Pakistan due to poor compliance with immunization schedules. Vaccine administration in rural provinces is challenging because of understaffed, understocked, and sparsely-located healthcare centers.

Melanie Bannister-Tyrrell of Ausvet in Australia will create an SMS-based communication system for farmers in Kenya to anonymously report crop disease and pest infestations and generate surveillance data to minimize crop loss. Pest infestation and disease cause substantial crop losses each year. In many low-income countries, farmers do not report disease to local agricultural authorities because they fear their crops will be destroyed without compensation. Yet information on the presence and spread of pests is needed to inform decisions on planting and control measures.

Fatema Khatun of the International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh in Bangladesh will develop a digital intervention to enable sharing of existing digital health data between community health workers and provide them with feedback indicators along with tailored messaging to parents to improve timeliness and coverage of vaccination against tuberculosis in rural Bangladesh. Tuberculosis is the number one cause of death by infectious disease worldwide, and 95% of deaths occur in developing countries.

Etienne Berges and team of Christian Aid in the United Kingdom will develop a Facebook-based program to increase the demand for and convenience of vaccination services in rural Myanmar. Fewer than 60% of children under two years of age in Myanmar have received all of the recommended vaccinations; the percentage in rural areas is lower as the process is seen to be inconvenient and of low priority. Facebook is widely used for information sharing between caregivers: 85% of Myanmar’s internet traffic goes through Facebook.