What is it about?
Most of the population of sub-Saharan Africa do not have access to adequate diagnostic tests for important health problems like infectious diseases. Creating the infrastructure needed for everyone to have access to high quality diagnostic laboratories is currently unaffordable. Here we propose that a new generation of digital diagnostics provide a solution to this problem which could underpin more efficient and equitable healthcare. These palm-of-your hand digital diagnostics can bring highly accurate diagnosis to the point-of-need, with instantaneous data connectivity to inform public health interventions.
Featured Image
Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash
Why is it important?
Accurate diagnosis is fundamental to giving the right treatment to a patient, and to understanding the burden of a disease. Without adequate diagnostics for infectious diseases we don't know where the the greatest burden of disease is, or how it is changing, and we can't identify emerging infectious diseases. Fundamentally, without adequate diagnostics we are "flying blind". Furthermore, the greatest gap between diagnostic need and diagnostic availability typically affects the poorest and most remote populations, who typically suffer the greatest burdens of infectious disease. Improving access to high quality diagnostics is an essential part of strategies to tackle globally important infectious diseases like malaria, and to reach multiple sustainable development goals.
Perspectives
This article brings together the perspectives of a wide range of researchers and practitioners representing diverse African countries. It sets the scene for the development of the next generation of portable diagnostics, which have the potential to leapfrog over the need for hard-wired infrastructure, creating a new model of healthcare where diagnosis can be performed wherever it is needed, and allowing the correct treatment to be rapidly given wherever the patient may be.
Aubrey Cunnington
Imperial College London
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: The potential of digital molecular diagnostics for infectious diseases in sub-Saharan Africa, PLOS Digital Health, June 2022, PLOS,
DOI: 10.1371/journal.pdig.0000064.
You can read the full text:
Resources
Contributors
The following have contributed to this page
