16th to 17th April 2016 was a beautiful weekend with the perfect spring like weather in the downtown New Haven area of Connecticut.
The great Shubert theater alongside other historic venues hosted the Unite for sight 2016 Global Health and Innovation conference.
I was privileged to listen to seasoned speakers give talks on health and technology and to attend the social impact lab (early stage ideas), which featured innovators working to improve the quality of life of people everywhere and especially that of the developing world populace. $10,000 and $2,000 awards were given to qualifying participants of the health innovation competition.
Many sessions were centered on innovations and technology, data, global health, work in Africa and the developing world at large.
Challenges such as the need to improve maternal and child health in Haiti, tackling obstetric fistula in Africa, HPV vaccination, cataract eye surgeries, improving access to safe surgeries in resource constrained settings, malaria and mHealth, universal health coverage, challenges with nutrition at different levels (to mention a few) were discussed at the sessions.
The take home point for me, and one of the main highlights of the conference was the emphasis on the creation and development of innovative solutions to address the health and development challenges experienced both in the developed and in the developing world.
Bobby Jefferson, the director, center development informatics, Palladium made it clear that there are funding opportunities available for innovations and especially in Africa. In his talk titled "Innovations in mHealth: lessons from the field," he spoke of the several innovations in sub Saharan Africa that he and his team have been involved with and discussed various ways to improve the adoption of innovative solutions and minimize cost on the journey to establishing the innovation solutions.
Other sessions centered on sustainable development and the climate change agenda were also held.
Participating in the 13th annual Unite for sight conference was educative, informative and magnified the rays of hope for sustainable solutions and development for Africa and the developing world.
It was nice to know that we are not alone in the quest for development within the African health terrain. It was also great to meet with and see so many great minds working to ensure development in the most impoverished regions of the world.
Keep up the good work!
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