How Technology Can Help Fight Ebola
Most of us today take for granted the amazing computational power we carry around with us, every day, in our pockets and bags. Smart phones and tablets have been hot consumer tech for well over 4 years now and are great for surfing the web, online shopping, communicating with friends and family over social networks and even playing games or reading books – when we have the time. However, pushing aside the consumerism that both drives, and is driven by, these devices, can we actually use smart phones and tablets for more serious applications? Can we, for instance, save lives with new emerging technologies such as these?
This is a question currently being asked as doctors in West Africa are fighting to contain an Ebola epidemic – a virus with a fatality rate of up to 90%, presently with no proven cure or vaccine – sometimes with as few as one doctor per 10,000 people, such as in rural Guinea. It seems technology can help, as suggested by four doctors at the Mercy hospital research laboratory in Bo, Sierra Leone;
“Emerging technologies can help early warning systems, outbreak response, and communication between health-care providers, wildlife and veterinary professionals, local and national health authorities, and international health agencies.” [1]
The piece, published in The Lancet, highlights many key areas where technology, and in particular smartphones, can help fight the epidemic including ‘open-source software programmes that receive and send bulk SMS messages can be used for communication with populations and peripheral health centres’ and ‘digitalised maps’ created with satellite images used to ‘improve the accuracy of case mapping’.[1]
Mobile phones have become ubiquitous in West Africa in recent years, with researchers believing that internet use on mobile phones is set to increase 20-fold in the next five years – double the rate of growth compared to the rest of the world.[2] This has come about due to the availability of cheaper smartphones and relative lack of physical infrastructure and access to reliable electricity. Researchers also cite apps, such as MedAfrica[3], as good examples for providing basic medical information, which reduce the need for doctors to travel great distances to reach patients for lower priority, or non-critical, assistance.
Data models for tracking vector trends, infection rates and populous movements are critical when combating an epidemic of this kind. Technology provides a medium for data management and distribution as well. By virtue of being portable and often tied to an individual, mobile phones become very powerful data collection tools.
Magpi, a company owned by infectious disease expert Dr Joel Selanikio, uses mobile data collection and messaging software to assist in crisis situations. The software has recently been used in Dallas, USA to track down individuals who came in contact with Thomas Eric Duncan (who contracted Ebola and later passed away), contact them and if possible monitor them for changes over time. This process, called contract tracing, can dramatically improve the speed and efficiency in the response to such virus outbreaks such as Ebola.
Mobile phones are a vital communications and data collection/distribution resource;
“So if you think of all of the population of West Africa, and you think of all the mobile phones that they have, and there’s probably in the cities 100 percent of the population has a mobile phone. In the countryside it’s probably, 40 or 50 percent has a mobile phone. But everyone has access to one,” Selanikio pointed out.[3]
It’s fair to say that modern technology allows us to collect more accurate data, more efficiently and quickly. It allows us to analyse trends and make predictions based on that data. It allows us to educate and inform individuals and, ultimately, as a tool it can help us save lives. Never has ‘big-data’ and mobile been more important than right now.
[1] http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736%2814%2961119-3/fulltext
[2] http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jun/05/internet-use-mobile-phones-africa-predicted-increase-20-fold
[3] http://www.voanews.com/audio/2477845.html