Ministerial side event on the use of Artificial Intelligence in the African health sector

22, August 2022 - 09:00 | COVID-19 Health Innovations

Artificial Intelligence (AI) has the potential to offer new insights and tools to improve clinical decision making, offer predictive analytics for health emergency preparedness, mitigate workforce shortages, tailor program targeting to areas of greatest need, improve forecasting of disease outbreaks and bring efficiencies to health service delivery across the African region. Realizing the potential of digital health and AI to achieve development goals will require collaboratively addressing multiple challenges, including strengthening underlying digital infrastructure and digital health systems, working to improve data quality, responsible management and sharing of available data, and eventually trust and utilization of data to inform strategic planning.

In a bid to urge this collaboration the Ministerial round table side event on AI was held on the 25^th of August At the 72nd WHO Regional Committee for Africa in Lomé, Togo. The round table focused on validating proposed actions developed from the June 2021 technical workshop themed “Health Status Transformation and the Role of AI for health and pandemic preparedness in the African Context”. Hence the round table provided a basis for outlining the future path for digital health and AI for health, including investment opportunities, in the African Region. At the event key activities included:

1. Showcasing AI-driven health solutions developed and implemented by the Member States in the African Region.
2. Identifying concrete actions for shaping policy and enabling environments to foster digital technologies for accelerated improvements in health and related development programs.

Commitments were given by the attending Ministers of Health, Ministers of ICT and other key stakeholders to foster an enabling environment for the use of digital technologies such as Artificial Intelligence (AI) in the health sector at national level. It was reiterated that there is a need for enhanced adoption on the use of AI and other digital technologies to transform the health sector in the African Region.

Additional information on AI guidance

Key policy guidance that has been produced by WHO to guide and support the use of AI across member states  include the WHO AI guidance document entitled “Ethics and Governance of Artificial Intelligence for Health; the WHO global strategy on digital health; the WHO AFRO Framework for Implementing the Global Strategy on Digital Health in The WHO African Region;. Additionally, WHO has also developed several training programmes aimed at raising AI and its application in health, including a recent course based on the WHO guidance on Ethics and Governance of AI. Furthermore, the ITU and WHO, through various collaborative activities that include the Focus Group on Artificial Intelligence for health, aimed to establish standardized assessment frameworks that can support the evaluation of AI-based methods for health and, through joint capacity-building programmes, have delivered training to enhance and strengthen digital skills for health.

WHO AFRO Innovation unit partnering with i3 on a health product distribution innovation challenge

01, July 2022 - 09:00 | COVID-19 Health Innovations

From the onset of Covid-19 pandemic, supply chain across industries including the health sector were disrupted across the world. This resulted in high demand for innovative solutions to address such health needs in the African region and the world. Therefore WHO AFRO through its innovation platform has been showcasing the various science driven innovations developed in the African region and across the globe in various areas including Covid-19, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Vaccine delivery and more.  

WHO AFRO Innovation unit on a quest to influencing innovation in the African region through fostering, scaling up and amplifying science driven innovations, continues to support scaling up of cost-effective innovations across the various  African countries' health sectors. One of these initiatives is by partnering with organizations such as i3 through this 2022 innovation challenge which will help support companies who offer data-driven innovations which assist with the distribution of medicines, consumables, medical devices, assistive technologies, and medical waste in African health care systems. The rewards and benefits under this challenge will include a $50,000 grant as well as access to leading donors, industry and institutional players who will support introductions to customers. WHO AFRO is also partnering in this 2022 challenge in order to support innovators and integrate their innovations across the African health systems, addressing the various health related needs targeting difficult to reach areas and marginalized communities. To apply for this challenge please visit the following link https://innovationsinafrica.com/application

WHISPA

10, May 2022 - 08:10 | COVID-19 Health Innovations

WHISPA is a mobile application that serves to equip and educate young people about their sexual and reproductive health (SRH) while connecting them to products and services in a discrete manner.  The application offers young people access to quality sexual and reproductive health education. This is through services such as private or anonymous telemedicine consultations, contraceptive counselling, affordable means to book contraceptive appointments, cervical cancer screening and vaccination, comprehensive tests for Sexually Transmitted Infections (STIs) and more. The target group is mainly women and the aim is to empower them. WHISPA was launched in Nigeria in April 2020 through the personal and professional experiences that the founder faced due to challenges that young people continually face when trying to access sexual and reproductive healthcare. In addition, WHISPA was one of the Top 30 innovations selected by WHO AFRO for the 2019 Innovation challenge. For more information about the WHISPA platform, click here.