If you are one the many people doing awareness campaigns or writing letters for Bread for the World and like-minded organizations (as my husband and I have done for years), you might be interested and dismayed to know that the target for the Millennium Development Goals is far from being reached. Much of the blame lies in the failure of both government and business to leverage new technologies to address health and hunger issues worldwide.
"We are actually going to admit that we are way off achieving these targets and particularly on health," Principal Adviser to the United Nations Office for Partnership Denis Gilhooly said.
Mr Gilhooly said the three health-related goals of the Millennium development project - child mortality, maternal health and infectious diseases - were most at risk of missing their targets as developed and developing nations failed to leverage information communication technology to redress failings and high service costs in current health systems.
"Health is the biggest challenge because it underpins everything. The problem is that in the health sector we are living in silos. The doctors are one of the real problems because they are incredibly resistant to technological change and moving forward. There are also data and confidentiality problems that are inherent in health," Mr Gilhooly said.
This quote, also by Mr. Gilhooly, is really the crux of the issue, in my opinion:
"We have to get away from thinking of mobile as a cash cow and start seeing it as a social and economic enabler for the whole economy."
Read the whole story: www.theaustralian.com.au
Comments