Digital tech, data emerge as major virus battle tools

Data and communication technologies have emerged as major Covid-19 epidemic battle tools, with rapid mortality surveillance (RMS) used to gauge impact and more than one million people having used the digital Covid-19 self-assessment tool HealthCheck.

The digital assessment tool allows for early detection, mapping and management of Covid-19 cases using unstructured supplementary service data (USSD), a communications protocol used by GSM cellphones to communicate with the network operator’s computers, as well as the official Covid-19 WhatsApp Service, Covid-19 Connect.

People will be able to use HealthCheck to self-assess their Covid-19 risk by completing few questions and, based on their answers and their symptoms or exposure history, they will be classified as low, moderate or high risk and suggested actions or guidelines will be recommended.

Launched by the health department in April, the tool comes at a crucial moment in the South African government’s Covid-19 response; when certain aspects of the country’s lockdown have been relaxed and more responsibility is being placed on individuals to ensure their own health when going back to work or school and engaging in other activities.

HealthCheck issues receipts after self-screening, providing them with an endorsed declaration of their risk level with a validity period of 24 hours.

Based on guidelines provided by the health department, should the results of the self-check require further action, users will be guided to self-isolate, test or get emergency care.

According to Dr Philip Setel, vice-president of the civil registration and vital statistics program at Vital Strategies, in the months since the World Health Organisation declared Covid-19 a pandemic, the number of cases and deaths has emerged as paramount to coordinating an effective response.

But these indicators were challenging to measure and reflect only a portion of the burden and distribution of the outbreak.

Setel said to support governments in enhancing their outbreak surveillance and response planning, they have launched a new technical package to help guide governments in RMS, informing decision-making based on the true impact of Covid-19 in their countries.

Rapid mortality surveillance generates daily or weekly counts of total fatalities by age, sex, date of death, place of death and place of usual residence – providing a fuller picture of the scale and direction of the pandemic, including deaths that are not able to be confirmed.

This also includes indirect mortality burden caused by disruptions to access and use of health services and the interaction of the virus with pre-existing conditions.

– siphom@citizen.co.za

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