Experts, electricity ‘not needed’ for health innovations

ABSTRACT

Speed read WHO compendium of innovations aims to help low-resource settings respond to COVID-19 Collection of tools doesn’t require specialists or electricity, says WHO Grassroots capacity building crucial for scale-up — expert Easy-to-use equipment including portable respiratory monitoring systems and ventilators with extended battery life are among a collection of new health innovations identified by the World Health Organization (WHO) to help manage COVID-19 in low-resource settings. Jeremiah Owiti, executive director, Centre for Independent Research, Nairobi Adriana Velazquez Berumen, WHO senior advisor for medical devices, said “WHO has been collecting innovative technologies that can be impactful at places where there is unstable electricity and a lack of specialised health workforce.” According to Anuraj Shankar, lead researcher at the Eijkman-Oxford Clinical Research Unit in Jakarta, Indonesia, enabling anyone to asses blood pressure accurately with an already available device such as a smartphone opens the door to personal monitoring of many acute and chronic medical conditions.