mHealth for Development

mHealth (shorthand for 'mobile health') is a topic about which I admittedly know quite little, yet am beginning to gain interest in through various friends and colleagues active in the field. To the best of my knowledge, at the forefront of mHealth initiatives is the UN Foundation and Vodafone Group Partnership created in October 2005. Together they've recently released a report, mHealth for Development: The Opportunity of Mobile Technology for Healthcare in the Developing World, in which is examined the potential for mobile phones in improving health in the developing world; future health needs in developing countries; and potential roadblocks for sustainable mHealth programs.

Mead Oliver offers a rather critical analysis of the report, addressing some of the pressing questions surrounding mHealth. Perhaps most importantly (at least from my humble perspective) is the question of how to design incentives for truthful data collection by cell phone:

The problem in using cell phones for flu surveillance is that of incentives. How does one induce the general public to accurately report outbreaks of flu? People might under-report for fear that an intervention would be draconian. This fear could be offset with a campaign describing the nature of the intervention and perhaps by rewarding those who report with free cell phone minutes. On the other hand, If one gives away cell phone minutes for reports of flu episodes, people might over-report. The [UN/Vodafone] report suggests that these incorrect reports were entirely due to a misunderstanding based on language, when intentional misreporting in hopes of receiving the promised reward may have instead been the problem.

Despite such persisting challenges, there are presently upwards of 50 active mHealth projects, the majority of which are in sub-Saharan Africa.  Among the most promising of these is Project Masiluleke, a mobile health project started in South Africa in 2008 which uses text messages to reach people in the most remote areas of the country to encourage them to get information and counseling on HIV/AIDS. The project delivers approximately 1 million HIV/AIDS and tuberculosis texts each day to personal cell phones providing contact information for the national AIDS helpline:

Callers to the national helpline can ask questions about HIV, get information about where to get tested and receive counseling.

The project takes advantage of a popular form of texting across Africa, called a "please call me" message, that can be sent for free from a phone even if it is out of pre-paid minutes. The empty characters on the free text are used to convey the health message.

Future phases of the project will allow users to text health questions, if they prefer not to call the line, and will provide an internet portal of information accessible by cell phone for people to learn about HIV. The ultimate goal, says the group, would be to provide free home HIV testing kits that would be supported by mobile counseling, so that people who aren't willing to visit a clinic can find out their status.

For now, much of such mHealth programs appear quite confined to sub-Saharan Africa, with a few projects scattered throughout Latin America and Southeast Asia. It will be most interesting to track the success of these projects to uncover whether they might prove equally successful elsewhere. Jumping the gun a bit, Nokia Research has already begun working with humanitarian agencies in India and psychiatrists in China to identify the potential m-technology might hold for remote populations there.

Take a walk down Jeune Street

Geoff Cameron, a fellow Oxford classmate and friend of mine, has a most wonderful blog in which he examines the intersection between religion, governance and world development. It is written from a Baha'i perspective, offering some most interesting insights into the state of our world today. Please pay him a visit at Jeune Street.

Fallows on the (alleged) end of the Chinese dream

With the economic crisis in full swing, dwindling (Chinese) export figures, heightened unemployment, and a general slowdown in domestic production, scholars and policy makers alike are beginning to wonder whether this may be the end of the Chinese dream as we know it (see, for instance, here and here). In a great analysis piece James Fallows offers his two cents (spoiler: his short answer is no): 

In Beijing, in Shanghai, in Shenzhen, and elsewhere, I’ve recently visited companies that are trying to use the disruption of this moment to enter wholly new markets and do what so few Chinese firms have yet done: make high-tech, high-value products that bring high rewards. In a country as big and chaotic as China, you can find illustrations of any “trend” you want. But in only a few weeks of asking, I found indications of companies that were growing rather than shrinking, and of corporate leaders who were pouring in money based on their belief that now, when competitors are at their weakest and talent and assets could be snapped up cheap, is the time to prepare for their next big advance.

In Shenzhen, north of Hong Kong, I went to see Liam Casey, the Irish entrepreneur I described two years ago as “Mr. China” for his success in matching big, famous foreign companies with small, obscure Chinese factories that can produce brand-name products quickly and well. Casey said that of the top 100 Chinese companies he works with regularly, not one had gone out of business. While many were struggling, some viewed the recession as a chance to move into higher-value work and introduce their own advanced products rather than serving strictly as subcontractors. (Several such items, like new tablet computers and handheld GPS devices, were displayed at the latest Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.)