Abstract
The introduction of the eight Millennium Development Goals (MDG’s) by the UN has highlighted the need to improve healthcare conditions across the globe. These goals are particularly pertinent in Somalia, one of the least developed countries in the world. This paper intends to look at the way the burgeoning telecommunications network in Somalia can benefit healthcare professionals by providing access to the internet which in turn provides access to information that can improve healthcare. The paper will argue that although the development of healthcare is commonly associated with the modernization paradigm, the internet can offer a more participatory approach to benefit healthcare professionals in Somalia.
Highlights
The introduction of the eight Millennium Development Goals (MDG’s) by the UN has highlighted the need to improve healthcare conditions across the globe
This dramatic advance in the availability and speed of the internet offers the potential for healthcare professionals in Somalia to access a global wealth of knowledge and information
Developing the internet as a source of information for healthcare professionals in Somalia highlights a wider debate over how communication can be used for development
Summary
The healthcare situation in Somalia, is not without hope and one avenue that has traditionally been used for development is the media. It offers speeds of up to 15mb/second within a 1.5km radius of central Mogadishu and 11mb/second elsewhere, according to its products and services manager, Abulkadir Hassan Ahmed (Winter, 2004) This is impressive considering Somalia’s instability and the fact that only fifteen countries in the year 2000 had internet speeds of above 1mb/second (Jensen, 2000:4). In addition to the increases in speed and availability, Somalia boasts some of the cheapest internet rates in the whole of Africa with an hour costing as little as 50 cents (Winter, 2004) This dramatic advance in the availability and speed of the internet offers the potential for healthcare professionals in Somalia to access a global wealth of knowledge and information. The importance of which is not to be underestimated: ‘it was estimated that of approximately 50 million people who died each year in the 1980’s, two thirds could have been saved through the application of existing but non available knowledge’ (Geyoushi et al, 2003:501)
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