About the Primer
The COVID-19 pandemic prompted the largest vaccination campaign effort in history, as national governments, international organizations, nonprofits and the private sector sought to vaccinate the world’s population. At the same time, the pandemic also accelerated the adaptation and adoption of digital health tools in low- and middle-income countries and focused attention on the importance of high-quality disaggregated data to help understand what populations are most vulnerable and how to best target immunization efforts.
USAID, DICE, and Digital Square developed a Primer on Digital Solutions for COVID-19 Vaccination Service Delivery to provide examples to planners, funders, and implementers looking to utilize digital health tools for pandemic and post pandemic response. Created to guide digital investments in support of the COVID-19 vaccination response, the primer showcases case studies that highlight the use of data and digital health tools to support immunization service delivery.
About the Framework
Examples of use case
Use Case: Cold Chain
Taking the temperature for cold chain
- The Kenya Expanded Programme on Immunization (EPI) used Varo as part of an inventory exercise to capture temperature data from thousands of Cold Chain Equipment (CCE), giving insights into equipment inventory and performance.
- Varo is a free app that allows users to download and email temperature data from standard 30 day temperature loggers.
- Reports can be automatically aggregated by the free app Pogo, helping administrators assess CCE performance and plan interventions like warranty claims and service visits.
- The Kenyan Ministry of Health also uses Nexleaf Analytics’ ColdTrace tools to monitor the temperature of COVID-19 vaccines in transit from the national storage site in Kitengela to regional facilities.
Use Case: Microplanning
Interoperable platforms map opportunities
- Nigeria’s National Primary Health Care Development Agency (NPHCDA) is using GRID3 data and maps as a primary digital microplanning tool.
- GRID3 offers geo-referenced infrastructure and demographic data for development to create hyperlocal paper planning maps that show priority and target population estimates, or local government areas, to support microplanning in Nigeria.
- The solution also allows staff supporting vaccine campaigns to use digital maps to: navigate to distribution sites (point-based or household), capture real-time data, create population and mobility estimates, and build infrastructure maps.
Use Case: Risk communication and engagement
Adaptable tools for targeted mass messaging
- In Malawi, UNICEF worked with the Ministry of Health (MOH) and partners to build a scalable, SMS-based COVID-19 communications and management solution using RapidPro.
- The tool allows the MOH to reach those in quarantine, perform real-time tracking of symptoms, and align to infection prevention and control measures.
- The solution’s interoperability with other components of Malawi’s electronic disease surveillance system makes information available instantly to authorized users and facilitates straightforward data aggregation.
- It also integrates with social media messengers (e.g. WhatsApp, Viber).