It’s long been established that mobile phones these days are no longer just used for calls and text messaging. Its compactness and portability have allowed engineers, app developers or anyone with imagination to use it for different purposes.
And it applies very much so in development, particularly in the health sector. There’s now an app being used by community health workers for contact tracing of people exposed to the Ebola virus in Guinea. A team of eye care experts and engineers have also developed and tested a smartphone adapter that health workers can use for professional eye examinations in remote, hard-to-reach villages in developing countries like Botswana, Kenya and Mali.
Other organizations meanwhile raise awareness about specific health issues like maternal health or the importance of deworming for children by marketing their apps in the form of games, like those developed by Half the Sky Movement.