According to the World Bank, 400 million people lack access to essential healthcare services globally, most of which reside in Africa and South Asia. Sajjad Kamal, health tech partner at   Global Ventures, offers his insights…

Addressing healthcare needs in emerging economies is not a matter of replicating applications and practices from more developed markets simply because the operating realities are radically different.

The limitations in emerging markets don’t necessarily prevent them from reaching a stage of equitable, inclusive and affordable care.

Quite the opposite: they act as key enablers of that objective. 

The answer is to reimagine healthcare in emerging economies through innovative practices, accounting for the operating environment in which patients, providers and practitioners are.

This environment is characterised by the absence of legacy infrastructure, including large hospital facilities, endless paper trails and records, bureaucratic procedures but also… newer, digital models of care. 

While the mature markets shift from siloed, coded, data-centred traditional health tech models to entirely new models, emerging economies are uniquely positioned to skip the middle step and move directly into cloud-based, open-source, integrated, social and mobile models of healthcare.  

The challenge today, however, is not just delivering good healthcare but delivering it sustainably –  safeguarding the environment while improving quality of life.

In many ways, the leapfrogging opportunity allows emerging markets to build healthcare sustainably from scratch by accounting, from the start, for environmental, social and economic factors. 

With healthcare systems reimagined for emerging markets, each pillar of sustainability co-exists independently as novel; innovative infrastructures are built. 

Medical waste and its impact

Activities of a healthcare system significantly impact and pressurise the environment.  Healthcare facilities have a more significant environmental impact due to medical waste generated, cooling and heating needs and the effect of continuously operating medical equipment. 

The use of facilities can be reduced by delivering care at home and reimagining how care is provided with a smaller footprint.

Telehealth helps deliver care with a smaller footprint. Altibbi, a Jordanian health tech, provides medical information and remote medical consultation services for 400 million people in the Arab World who lack access to essential medical services.

Altibbi reduces the carbon emissions required for physical visits by providing self-service content and escalation through virtual tele-consultations.

It reduces environmental impact and makes healthcare economical by increasing efficiency. Paired with longitudinal data, its digital platform reduces the cost of care, making healthcare more economical. 

This is a unique trait of emerging market companies. All components of the sustainable spectrum co-exist to yield a more significant impact.

Lack of access for health services

According to a World Bank and WHO report, at least half of the world’s population cannot obtain essential health services. Each year, many households are pushed into poverty because they pay for health care out of their pockets. Healthcare in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) remains the least served worldwide.

With few countries able to spend a minimum of $34 to $40 per person per year – an amount the WHO considers enough for primary health care access – access to healthcare in SSA remains limited. 

Diagnostic services play a vital role in early disease detection, and prevention is significantly cheaper than cure. Early and frequent diagnosis reduces the cost burden in the long run to make healthcare affordable for emerging countries.

Globally, diagnostic tests cost an average of $20, with test readers costing over $30,000, requiring trained technicians to operate.

AI solution

A platform re-imagining diagnostic delivery in emerging markets is Kenya’s Ilara Health. The company distributes low-cost, AI-powered diagnostic devices directly to primary care doctors in peri-urban and rural clinics, where the availability of standard diagnostics is poor. 

By leveraging low-cost, smaller form factors, minimal training and closer proximity to patient homes, Ilara delivers healthcare at a fraction of the cost, creating social impact by providing high-quality care to more people.

Novel diagnostics are being imagined for emerging markets. Diagnostics for All, a Boston-based startup, is developing paper-based diagnostics tests of postage stamp size. 

The paper contains chemicals that react with blood, urine, saliva or sweat samples, which allows for a health screening with a change of colour. Such innovations reduce medical waste and lower diagnostic care price points. 

In the context of sustainability, healthcare access touches many stakeholders and a wealth of data. Every stakeholder must uphold their integrity along the healthcare value chain to deliver healthcare ethically.

Expired medication “one malpractice”

One malpractice prevalent in healthcare across emerging markets is the consumption of expired medication. Between 30%-40% of all medicines in Africa are either sub-standard or fake.

The continent has some of the world’s highest branded drug prices and some of the lowest average incomes per capita. 

Technology platforms such as Remedial Health are re-imagining the supply chain of healthcare consumables, increasing transparency in pharmaceutical delivery by improving B2B access to medicines with full traceability and just-in-time stock. 

The Nigeria-based start-up is reducing waste in medication, reducing unnecessary margins levied by intermediaries. Remedial Health ensures authentic medication with adequate compliance is delivered to individuals. 

Their services reduce waste, address authenticity and make healthcare supplies more affordable. 

Steaming healthcare delivery with phones

Another way to streamline healthcare delivery in emerging markets is using mobile phones.  In Kenya, more people have access to mobile phones than ready access to primary health care. 

An application called M-Tiba uses mobile phones to administer healthcare payments between patients, payers and healthcare providers with greater transparency. Patients use the system to save, borrow, and share money for health care at a lower cost. 

The application offers healthcare financing via vouchers and low-cost insurance to specific populations. Providers receive payments quickly and reliably. Donors gain greater transparency into the use of the healthcare funds they disburse. 

The health workforce must be continuously trained and developed with the increasing complexity of diseases and the global population. The average doctor-to-patient ratio for Sub-Saharan Africa in 2019 was 0.2 per 1,000 people, the lowest globally.  

Addressing this challenge is a platform elevating healthcare training: Giblib.

The company curates and creates high-quality medical, educational videos featuring experts from notable medical institutions. 

Any physician delivering healthcare in SSA can receive global, high-calibre training without the environmental impact of travelling and elevating social impact by providing higher quality healthcare. 

Another example of innovative healthcare delivery reimagined for emerging markets is Proximie.

Proximie’s platform enables clinicians to virtually “scrub in” to any live case globally, elevating access and quality of clinical care in emerging markets. 

The company connects surgeons in real-time with augmented reality, data capture and predictive analytics, all powered by machine learning and artificial intelligence.

By leveraging technology to beam any medical expert worldwide, Proximie has a significant social impact by making healthcare affordable and accessible while elevating quality without incurring the environmental impact of travelling.

Sustainability should not be an “afterthought”

Sustainability in healthcare should not be an afterthought for addressing the needs of emerging markets. The region can serve as a model for more mature economies to explore how innovative practices can be applied to deliver healthcare sustainably with a reduced climate impact.

Emerging markets are adopting modern technologies such as portable medical devices, artificial intelligence, renewable power generation, and distributed medical records through mobile phones faster than more mature economies. 

With many illustrative examples to prove it, only a technology-leveraged world will enable us to experience healthcare services delivered sustainably.

Don’t miss…

Health systems “unfit to cope” with another pandemic, research shows