President William Ruto’s promise that Kenyans will now access quality medical healthcare at their doorstep as part of the government’s furtherance of universal healthcare has pushed the viability of digital health options to the forefront.

The President’s remarks follow the unveiling of kits to Community Health Promoters in Nairobi, which included basic screening devices for household visits in addition to smartphones expected to aid in the transmission of personal biomedical data and other relevant information.

The right to health is a fundamental human right enshrined in the Constitution. Article 43(1) (a) provides that every person has the right to the highest attainable standard of health, which includes the right to health care services. Furthermore, Article 2(6) makes any treaty or convention ratified by Kenya legally binding.

As such, Article 12 of the International Convention on Economic Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) which provides for the right of everyone to enjoy the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health must be observed by the State in its entirety.

According to General Comment 14 of the Committee on Economic Social and Cultural Rights, the realisation of the right to health requires that health services be available in sufficient quantity and accessible to all without discrimination.

It also develops an obligation on the State to guarantee the right to seek, receive and impart information and ideas concerning health issues. Incorporation of technology in the medical kits is critical in the realisation of universal healthcare as envisioned in the Constitution and ICESCR. For one, it introduces screening equity in a country whose health landscape is still plagued by socio-economic inequalities that greatly limit access to quality care.

Medical screening devices thus help bridge gaps in access to healthcare services by offering low-cost and convenient solutions for early detection and monitoring. The timely detection of medical ailments offers Community Health Promoters the opportunity to not only suggest more effective treatment but also recommend individual lifestyle changes and other preventive measures.

In turn, high risk patients and prevalent health issues in specific communities can be identified sooner and have the appropriate resources allocated to them. The cost-benefit of leveraging technology for medical screening to the public health system must also be considered. Since early detection prevents the progression of diseases, this reduces the need for hospitalisation and intensive care, which is financially straining for both patients and the public health system. Consequently, the digitisation of the Promoter’s programme has the potential to encourage the universalisation of healthcare.

Moreover, the most noticeable impact of the smartphones is the potential to spur a growth in telemedicine. The World Health Organisation defines telemedicine as the use of information and telecommunications technologies by healthcare professionals to support the delivery of healthcare services where distance is a critical factor.

Seeing that Community Health Promoters will be working under the supervision of professional medics, smartphones allow patients in underserved and rural areas the rare chance to receive medical advice, share health data and consult with the appropriate community health worker or medic. Some of the ethical and legal implications that have rightly been pointed out include questions around patient autonomy and data privacy.

Another important aspect of digital health is that accessibility to universal healthcare might still be mitigated by economic realities such as the fact that there are still significant parts of the population that cannot afford smartphones and that hard to detect diseases may be missed in household screening visits.

In this case, as the government moves towards this promising direction, public engagement on the aforementioned concerns will be imperative.
— The writer is an independent researcher