Only innovation can reduce illness and poverty in Africa,
according to a program that is funding creative approaches to
healthcare in developing countries. More than 50,000 women die
each year of cervical cancer in Africa, according to World
Health Organization estimates, as more than 80% of the cases are
detected in late stages. In countries such as Tanzania, where
nearly 4,500 women die annually from the disease, the problem is
exacerbated by an acute shortage of medical experts and a lack
of quality screening services, especially in rural areas. But
now a group of Canadian and Tanzanian health innovators have
joined forces to apply simple and safe mobile technologies to
improve cervical cancer screening and thus potentially reduce
mortality rates in the East African country. The idea is to send
teams of two trained non-physician healthcare workers in remote
Tanzania to examine women living several hours away from health
centers. The nurses, who will be equipped with cervical
screening and treatment tools a