HealthText: SMS and Community Radio Activate Health Information Flow in a Kenyan Slum

The project seeks to ensure that citizens are informed faster about disease outbreaks and emerging health trends, becoming empowered with information to take preventative and curative action. Meanwhile, community health workers will be able to improve their targeting of resources and communication with their full network of colleagues serving Korogocho.

The mapping project is designed to create an information chain from community health workers to the radio station to listeners, using SMS text messaging and new media platforms. Health information trends are identified and located, then interpreted and broadcast on Koch FM, a community radio station in Korogocho.

To lay the groundwork for the project, Internews and Google partnered to develop an interactive map of the Kenyan slum of Korogocho in Nairobi. The map will help monitor and visualise timely health information in the community. The project was carried out by a group of Korogocho residents, journalists from Koch FM, and health workers who mapped out the nine villages within Korogocho in immense detail.

Click here to view the map in Google Map Maker.

According to the organisers, knowing where people are on a map has an ability to bring people together, even in the most difficult living conditions. Residents showed great enthusiasm during community mapping, and partners were impressed at what the group had done in just three days of mapping. One of the journalists working on the project also said that besides the excitement of putting his station on the map, he is now better able to visualise the area where his station reports from and broadcasts. He said that this will help him network with community health workers and residents who will contribute in gathering information for the station. Organisers report that health workers have also mentioned it will make coordination of their work much easier.

Health

The slum of Korogocho in Nairobi, Kenya is one of the largest by population in Africa with some 200,000 people living in an area no bigger than a few New York City blocks.