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Frugal Innovation: Key to India’s Healthy Future?
Way back in 2009, watching the Bollywood movie ‘3 Idiots’, I remember scoffing at one of the movie sequences where the protagonist Aamir Khan facilitates the delivery of a baby using a vacuum cleaner and an inverter made from a car battery. I somehow could not relate with the idea that a vacuum cleaner could be used as a suction pump to deliver babies. However, at that time I settled down to thinking that after all it’s from a Bollywood movie where anything is possible.
- Categories
- Health Care
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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New Microfinance Initiative to Bring First ‘Lease to Purchase’ Sustainable Energy Product to Somalia
Dahabshiil Group showcase sustainable 'green microfinancing' initiatives to foster economic and social development across Somali region.
- Categories
- Energy, Environment
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
- Tags
- microfinance, solar
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Vodafone Brings Mobile Money to 15M People Without Bank Acccounts in Ghana
Vodafone has launched its mobile money scheme M-Pesa in Ghana, bringing a cash transfer service to the 15m people in the country who do not have a bank account.
- Categories
- Technology
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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M-Tiba Health App Launched in Kenya
Safaricom has launched a new health payment application named M-Tiba in partnership with PharmAccess Foundation and CarePay, to make medical payments easier and more transparent.
- Categories
- Health Care, Technology
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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World Bank, IFC Unveil Off-Grid Lighting Solution for Nigeria
The World Bank and the International Finance Corporation (IFC) have unveiled an off-grid solar power solution for Nigeria tagged Lighting Africa.
- Categories
- Energy, Health Care
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
- Tags
- renewable energy, solar
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Safaricom Unveils ‘Mobile Wallets’ Initiative for Healthcare
A new mobile money platform has been launched to help donors disburse money directly to beneficiaries and track its usage.
- Categories
- Health Care, Technology
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Report: West African impact investing totalled $6.8 billion in last decade
The impact investing industry in West Africa is comparatively small, but growing, totalling US$6.8 billion over the past decade, according to research by the Global Impact Investing Network (GIIN).
- Categories
- Investing
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
- Tags
- impact investing
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The Ebola Vaccine, Latrogenic Injuries, and Legal Liability
Making vaccines is a risky, oftentimes unenviable business. Vaccines are administered to healthy people who tend to be unforgiving if an adverse side effect or injury subsequently develops. The risk of being sued, even when a vaccine supplier follows best practices, combined with growing anti-vaccination sentiment, creates a climate that is not conducive to vaccine innovation. The dissuasive effect of litigation risk and legal liability is heightened both for vaccines aimed at diseases of poor countries, for which the financial inducements are weak anyway [1,2], and vaccines for public health emergencies, which are developed in accelerated clinical trials that may lack the statistical power or detailed follow-up necessary to detect rare adverse effects. Yet, as the West African Ebola outbreak demonstrates, the world can ill afford not to have vaccines against diseases of poverty in emergency situations [1]. Several reasons exist for not having a vaccine available, relating to the biology of the virus and the epidemiological challenges pertaining to evaluating a vaccine for a rare disease. However, financial incentives and disincentives for vaccine manufactures to invest in vaccine trials for rare diseases in resource-poor countries also need to be considered. We argue that, as one part of a comprehensive plan to promote vaccine development, there needs to be a plan to lessen the risks of litigation and liability to remove disincentives for these vaccines to be developed and later deployed. As others point out, no satisfactory plan now exists [3].
- Categories
- Health Care
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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