In recent years, a lot of attention has been focused on the threat posed by infectious diseases. With the current pandemonium surrounding the outbreak of Ebola in Africa, governments, humanitarian organizations, and private donors are clamoring to help. The World Health Organization (WHO) has stated that a vaccine could be available as early as 2015. And while this could certainly help to combat the spread of Ebola, more must be done to address the other infrastructural obstacles faced by people living in third world communities. If harnessed properly, modern technology could significantly reduce the impact of these outbreaks.
In earlier eras, when disease-fighting technology was rudimentary or even non-existent, the death toll could be severe indeed. To provide some historical context: Bubonic plague outbreaks in 14th century Europe and The Middle East caused the death of an estimated 200 million people throughout the world. Even as recently as 1918 – 1920, about 50 million deaths were caused by a worldwide pandemic of influenza. Compared to these figures, the fewer than 5,000 who’ve died in the recent Ebola epidemic pale by comparison.
In no way, however, does this undermine the severity of the crisis in Africa — nor does it trivialize the amount of work that will need to be done to contain Ebola in Africa. When dealing with outbreaks of new diseases, it’s hard to rely on vaccines or antibiotics, which are traditionally the most effective means of combating an epidemic. These methods are generally even more scarce in developing nations.
In the countries where vaccines or antibiotics aren’t readily available, sanitation becomes crucial. By using proper hygienic methods, such as hand sanitization and thorough cleaning procedures, many pathogens can be killed, slowing the spread of the disease. Afflicted individuals can be identified based upon their symptoms and quarantined to eliminate contact with non-infected people. Health-care workers and caregivers often don protective gear, including masks and gloves, to reduce their risk of exposure.
Along with these precautions that involve taking specific, physical actions, the proper use of data is vital. It’s important to disseminate information to the public and to medical professionals about the symptoms and means of infection whenever a contagious health risk presents itself. Electronic medical records can help to ensure that health-care professionals are following proper procedures. They can also enable the quick retrieval of the medical records of people who have had contact with anyone who is infected, allowing epidemiologists to take the necessary actions to try to contain any outbreak.
Despite the potential benefits of a fully integrated electronic medical records system, hospitals and doctors in the United States currently use a bewildering variety of incompatible systems. While there has been a push lately for the medical industry to use standardized, interoperable software, lack of funds and slow-moving bureaucracies have hindered these efforts. In fact, health care IT growth is actually driving much of the innovation in health care right now, and familiarity with modern technology is increasingly the main factor for the success of both experts in health technology and electronic records systems – the higher salaries available to IT workers familiar with EHR systems like Epic are driving experts towards those systems as hospitals increasingly adopt them, but compatibility issues between disparate platforms remain a big hurdle. In part due to these problems, a man in Dallas who complained of Ebola-like symptoms and had recently been in Liberia, an Ebola hotspot, was released from an emergency room. He was readmitted to the hospital two days later and diagnosed with Ebola.
There are several new technological developments that have the potential to change the way things are done. New smartphone apps for tracking the spread of diseases along with cloud-based computing solutions may make it possible to more easily identify people who are at risk of contracting a disease, while enabling medical staff to stay up-to-date on the condition of patients. Since contact with infected individuals is a significant pathway to infection for many pathogens, robots are being developed that can administer treatment without putting personnel at risk. A new technique for growing antibodies inside tobacco plants shows promise in being able to deliver results more cheaply and in greater quantities than the currently-popular process of cultivating antibodies using mouse cells.
In order to prevent or mitigate a large-scale outbreak of infectious diseases, it’s essential that the medical community uses the appropriate technology. By staying apprised of the latest developments and training workers in the proper use of cutting-edge technology, new infections can be reduced while improving the quality of care available to patients.
