News

Summaries of open source, health care, or health IT news and information from various sources on the web selected by Open Health News (OHNews) staff. Links are provided to the original news or information source, e.g. news article, web site, journal,blog, video, etc.

See the following -

Africa Goes Hi-tech: But Where Are All Those Keen Investors?

Osiame Molefe | Daily Maverick | May 8, 2012

They say necessity is the mother of invention and they talk about “Mother Africa”. Therefore, the tech revolution had to take root in inventive ways here, changing outsider perceptions of the continent. Investors, though, have been slow to tap into Africa’s tech boom. Read More »

Africa Groundwater Maps Could Help Improve Access To Water

Staff Writer | Huffington Post | April 20, 2012

Access to clean water remains a problem for millions in Africa, but new research suggests that there may be hope. Researchers from the British Geological Survey and University College London have mapped the quantity and potential yield of groundwater across the entire continent, explained PhysOrg. Read More »

Africa Innovations: 15 Ideas Helping To Transform A Continent

Mina Holland, Ian Tucker, et al. | The Guardian | August 25, 2012

A mobile phone database for dairy farmers and a strain of sweet potato that can help fight child blindness. These are just two of the imaginative new ideas that are tackling Africa's old problems Read More »

Africa Portal continues to raise the bar as top open-access resource for African policy research

Press Release | CIGI | November 27, 2012

Celebrating its anniversary, the Africa Portal continues to achieve great success as the leading open-access resource for policy research on Africa. Launched in November 2010, The Africa Portal is an online resource offering fresh and authoritative insight on Africa’s policy challenges — from climate change and energy issues to food security, conflict resolution, health and migration. Read More »

Africa's apps: farming to gaming

Toby Shapshak | The Guardian | October 30, 2012

Digital enterprise on the continent has sparked a range of user-friendly programs, from chat forums, photo-sharing, mobile health, crisis management apps, and the first mobile 'cow calendar'. Read More »

Africa's Mineral Wealth Hardly Denting Poverty Levels, Says World Bank

Mark Tran | The Guardian | October 5, 2012

Report finds discovery of oil and mineral resources doing little to improve prospects for poor people, whose lot may even worsen Read More »

Africa: 'Misguided' Nations Lock Up Valuable Geospatial Data

Staff Writer | allAfrica.com | January 15, 2014

Many governments, particularly those in low-income countries, are "shooting themselves in the foot" by failing to give research and development communities open access to their caches of geospatial data, experts have warned. Read More »

Africa: Breaking Down The Academic Paywalls, In Africa Too

Julie Blussé | allAfrica | April 5, 2013

Across Africa, academics and researchers face financial barriers that keep them from accessing the same knowledge their peers elsewhere in the world can afford. Read More »

Africa: New Push On Malaria

Julie Strupp | allAfrica.com | November 22, 2013

Malaria researchers believe that better coordination and new technologies, such as the use of vaccines and sophisticated disease mapping, can inject new life into the ambitious goal of eradicating the deadly illness. Read More »

Africa: Open-Source Opens Up Architecture For The Poor

Rachel Mundy | AllAfrica.com | August 10, 2013

Architects and community leaders are combining forces to lead the way in creating many types of innovative housing in developing nations as part of an open-source collaboration. Read More »

Africa: Partners Commit To Bolster Open Source Research

Press Release | Medicines for Malaria Venture (MMV), Drugs for Neglected Diseases initiative (DNDi), Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC) | November 27, 2013

The Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC), UK, Drugs for Neglected Diseases initiative (DNDi) and MMV have signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to collaborate in an effort to build a global community of researchers contributing to open source drug discovery for diseases of poverty. Read More »

Africa: Potential New Class Of Antimalarials Now Open Source

Staff Writer | allAfrica | September 10, 2013

This week, MMV hands the triazolopyrazines and their key data over to Dr Mat Todd at the University of Sydney, where research on these potential antimalarials will continue for all the world to see as part of the Open Source Malaria project. Read More »

Africa: The Pros And Cons Of Social Media In Global Health

Nick Ishmael Perkins | AllAfrica | October 21, 2013

I was invited to moderate a panel at the World Health Summit in Berlin this week. [...]Within the first three hours of the summit, two other sessions had acknowledged that global health governance needed a shake-up and should move away from top-down, supply-driven models. Could social media, with their emphasis on dialogue and inherent transparency, be the solution? Read More »

African Tech Hubs Put on the Map

Gareth van Zyl | ITWeb | February 24, 2012

A crowd-sourcing initiative to map all of Africa's tech hubs has been started by a group of Zambian-based technology enthusiasts and entrepreneurs...Currently, the Web Site has 15 hubs in 13 African countries, ranging from Nairobi's iHub to Nigeria's co-creation hub. Read More »

African Tech Hubs Put on the Map

Gareth van Zyl | ITWeb | February 24, 2012

A crowd-sourcing initiative to map all of Africa's tech hubs has been started by a group of Zambian-based technology enthusiasts and entrepreneurs. Read More »