Interswitch, Africa’s leading integrated digital payments and commerce company, today unveiled a new agreement with Toronto-based Fio Corporation to ramp up distribution of the company’s healthcare technology services in Nigeria.
Representatives from the two companies announced the news together during a joint press conference commemorating World Malaria Day and its theme for 2017: End Malaria for Good.
“The effects of malaria are devastating to the health and prosperity of people across Africa and other parts of the world where it has not been eliminated.” stated Uzor Okonmah- Head, Health Solutions at Interswitch. “This detectable and treatable disease continues to claim more than 400,000 lives each year. Our collaboration with Fio will put tools for automated disease testing and real-time tracking into the hands of more frontline health workers. Together we can advance progress toward malaria elimination in Nigeria and set an example for disease control programs around the globe.”
Fio’s intelligent mobile diagnostic device, called the Deki™ Reader, allows health workers in even the most remote areas to automate testing of suspected cases of malaria, and other infectious diseases, and transmit results in real time to the Fionet™ data system. As a result healthcare managers can log onto the Fionet™ web portal and monitor diagnostic data and other key metrics from the field at any time.
“Disease control is impossible when you are fighting an enemy you can’t see”, said Hayim Raclaw, vice-president and sales team lead at Fio Corporation. “Fio’s technology makes the invisible visible so that decision makers can take direct, transformative action. We are honoured to be working with Interswitch to take the impact of our services in Nigeria to the next level.”
The new agreement with Interswitch builds on Fio’s existing relationships in Nigeria, where the company’s technology is already being used to support the National Malaria Elimination Programme. Public health workers at 32 facilities in Akwa Ibom State are currently using Deki™ Readers and the Fionet™ system to augment malaria services, thanks to a collaboration launched with Africare last year.
According to the National Malaria Elimination Programme in Nigeria, malaria is responsible for 60% of outpatient visits to health facilities in Nigeria. Each year the disease accounts for 11% of maternal deaths, 30% of all childhood deaths, and 25% of deaths occurring before a child’s first birthday.
Nigeria is one of several malaria endemic countries within Africa and Latin America where Fio’s technology is being used to support control and elimination programs. Fio’s services are the latest addition to Interswitch’s suite of solutions for the health sector. This collaboration will further develop technologies to automate healthcare service delivery, operations and administration whilst standardizing reporting for analytics.
