The Journal of mHealth Vol 1 Issue 6 (Dec 2014) | Page 21

Industry News
tem to enable communities directly affected by Ebola to provide
valuable insight about how to fight it. Using mobile technology,
we have given them a voice and a channel to communicate their
experiences directly to the government.”
The system uses radio broadcasts to encourage people to get in
touch and express their opinions. Cambridge University’s Africa's Voices project has helped to develop a radio engagement
model, incorporating questions into public service announcements to elicit feedback from citizens in both English and Krio
– one of Sierra Leone's most widely spoken languages.
“Radio is a powerful medium in Africa but its potential to gather
and analyse audience feedback has not been fully seized,” said
Dr. Sharath Srinivasan, Director of Cambridge University’s
Centre of Governance and Human Rights. “We are working
with IBM to offer people across Sierra Leone a channel to voice
their opinions and, crucially, to ensure that the data is rapidly
analysed and turned into valuable insight about the effectiveness
of public service announcements and possible public misconceptions about Ebola.”
Telco operator Airtel has set up the toll-free number via which
citizens are able to send SMS messages.
“Mobile technology is Africa’s most powerful communications
platform providing an important channel for reaching large
numbers of the population,” said Sudipto Chowdhury, Managing
Director, Airtel, Sierra Leone. “As one of Africa's leading mobile
operators, we will do everything we can to ensure that mobile
technology contributes to tackling the spread of Ebola and we
are partnering with IBM to ensure the effective flow of information between the government and the citizens of Sierra Leone.”
The SMS data is anonymised by Kenyan start-up Echo mobile
which specialises in leveraging basic mobile phones to give voice
to underserved communities.
“We're working to make sure that the stream of messages from
patients, health workers and the general public can be used to
augment the response effort and provide a direct and near realtime view of the situation on the ground," said Jeremy Gordon,
Product Director, Echo Mobile.
IBM is currently looking to extend the work to analyse mobile
phone signal data in order to monitor and track population movement enabling scientists to map and predict the spread of disease.
Technology That Facilitates Coordination
Nigeria has taken a leadership position in the fight against
Ebola and has recently been declared free of the disease. To
support the country’s preparedness for future outbreaks, IBM
has donated its Connections technology to Nigeria’s Lagos State
Government.
Nigeria’s Lagos State Government hosts an Ebola Operations
Centre that coordinates disease containment efforts on behalf
of the Nigerian government and other organisations.
IBM’s technology donation will help strengthen the coordination of public health emergency response teams and ensure that
the Lagos State Government is able to manage and respond to

any new reported cases of Ebola or future epidemics.
IBM’s Connections technology has a proven track record in
humanitarian disaster response situations. It provides health
workers and administrators with a reliable and secure digital platform to work together virtually and in person, enabling them to
securely share documents, identify experts, exchange video, chat
and audio messages, provide updates, tap into information via
mobile devices and hold virtual meetings. Storing information
securely and conveniently in the digital cloud means that vital
information can be accessed by authorised users anywhere.
IBM has previously provided similar technology in other crisis situations around the world to support collaboration and
coordination amongst response agencies. In 2010, SmartCloud
supported a post-Haiti quake effort called Colleagues in Care,
which helped doctors in Haiti learn from doctors in the US and
elsewhere. The Chilean Red Cross used the platform to establish
a disaster command centre following the 2010 Chile earthquake.
The platform was also used by agencies in the US following
Hurricane Sandy in 2012 and for flooding recovery activities in
Colorado in 2013.
IBM is broadly offering access to its IBM Connections cloudbased platform to all government agencies and non-governmental organisations working to stem the spread of Ebola.
Ebola Open Data Repository
Globally, IBM volunteers are leading a community effort to help
identify, inventory and classify all open data sources related to
the Ebola outbreak and are calling on organisations worldwide
to contribute data.
The goal is to create a cloud-based Ebola Open Data Repository
which will provide governments, aid agencies and researchers
with free and open access to valuable open data related to Ebola.
To support the work, IBM volunteers helped organise a recent
Ebola Open Data brainstorming session in New York where members of the local tech community met with health experts and aid
organizations to develop Open Data solutions to help tackle Ebola.
"Data can be a powerful resource for managing and mitigating epidemics,” said Jeanne Holm, Evangelist for Data.Gov.
“Governments and other organizations have valuable open data
that could help in relief efforts - about roads, airports, schools,
medical facilities and populations. Such information can help
to drive data-driven decisions during times of uncertainty. IBM
is playing a key role in this initiative by helping to identify and
gather more open data sources that might inform decisions
around Ebola."
Around the world, cities, states and nations are publishing open
data and creating new data supply chains and ecosystems to
help tackle national and global challenges. Many African governments such as Sierra Leone, Liberia, Ghana, South Africa,
Malawi and Tanzania have joined the Open Government Partnership to take advantage of published open data to drive innovation and support better collaboration.
To learn more about IBM in Africa, visit: http://ibm.
co/1evaCes n

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