[Ip-health] Mobile phone technology and health impact measurement

[Aidan Hollis]

Incentives for Global Health is pleased to publish a discussion paper on th=
e use of widely available mobile phone technology to assist in the assessme=
nt of health impact. The paper proposes the extremely successful M-PESA mob=
ile phone banking system in Kenya as a model for a system of distributing, =
paying for, and monitoring HIF-registered products, especially in countries=
 where comprehensive health data is not currently collected. Such alternati=
ve models could make a key contribution to efficiency in monitoring uptake =
in a system that makes rewards dependent on actual health impact (i.e. in a=
 system such as the HIF in which the cost of R&D is de-linked from the pric=
e of medicines).

The MHIF System: Supporting the Health Impact Fund with Mobile Technology
Juggs Ravalia and Lennart Stern

http://www.yale.edu/macmillan/igh/discussion_papers.html

Abstract: The Health Impact Fund (HIF) is a proposal designed to incentiviz=
e pharmaceutical innovation by rewarding the development of new medicines i=
n proportion to their health impact. The health care sector is plagued by w=
astage and poor governance, especially in developing countries. The MHIF sy=
stem is a mobile payment and data collection system designed to enhance tra=
nsparency and accountability, whilst improving the quality of data availabl=
e for impact assessment. It also provides a platform for reporting misuse a=
nd abuse. The system is designed to mitigate some of the deployment challen=
ges of the HIF and to act as a springboard for further expansion into broad=
er mobile health (MHealth) solutions.

IGH welcomes comments and questions on this and other discussion papers.


Aidan Hollis
Professor of Economics

University of Calgary, 2500 University Dr NW Calgary AB T2N 1N4 Canada
tel: +1 403 220 5861  fax: +1 403 220 5861
email: ahollis@ucalgary.ca
web: http://econ.ucalgary.ca/hollis.htm

Incentives for Global Health
http://www.healthimpactfund.org