KT and Safaricom to build epidemic prevention platform in Kenya
KT will build an epidemic prevention platform in Kenya to prevent diseases such as Ebola, the company announced.
The South Korean telecommunications carrier will collaborate with its local counterpart Safaricom and local health authorities to build a Global Epidemic Prevention Platform (GEPP).
KT first proposed that global carriers share big data with each other during contagion emergencies back in 2016 following the Ebola outbreak in Africa, which that took hundreds of lives.
Kenya's neighbor, the Democratic Republic of Congo, suffered another Ebola outbreak this year, and as of last month, 225 people have died.
The GEPP in Kenya will analyse data from Safaricom subscribers traveling in known contagion danger zones as well as disease information registered on local databases.
Safaricom will then send texts to its subscribers informing them of preventative measures and what to do if they suspect that they have contracted a disease.
Kenya will monitor and collect data on how exposed its citizens are to diseases, and later use them in its health policies.
Safaricom has a market share of 70 percent in Kenya which will allow it to gain "real results" in contagion prevention, KT said.
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