Big Data for Humanity Posted on : Mar 15 - 2018

Big data analytics is the proverbial catnip for businesses looking for a competitive edge over their rivals, and it is easy to see why.

The ability to convert the primordial soup that is raw data into actual actionable information is instrumental in helping businesses distinguish themselves from their peers. Businesses can then act upon these insights to improve their efficiency, customer service, and profit margins.

But this technology is capable of so much more than just growing profit margins and increasing market share. Analytics can be applied to any data set, no matter how large, and no matter the topic. Healthcare is one such sector that is benefiting from the ability to analyse terabytes of historical and live data, which has led to a much worthier application of analytics – saving people’s lives.

With nearly half of the world’s population at risk of malaria, organisations worldwide are continuously looking for new ways to combat this global health issue. Over the past 15 years the non-profit organisation PATH has contributed to save 6.2 million lives, by using innovations in technology and cross-sector partnerships that help develop powerful tools and strategies. It is making a difference on a massive scale.

Malaria remains endemic in Africa. The World Health Organisation reported approximately 216 million malaria cases in 2016, with young children and pregnant women particularly vulnerable to the disease. Malaria still takes the life of a child in Africa every two minutes.

A new PATH project is making great progress to defeat the disease by putting data at the heart of its work. “Visualise No Malaria” is working with the Zambian government to harness big data analytics and the cloud with the aim of eradicating the disease from Zambia by 2020. This ties into the already existing wider “Elimination 8” campaign involving eight countries from southern Africa looking to eliminate Malaria by 2030.

The technology implemented by PATH has transformed the efficiency and response times of Zambia’s National Malaria Elimination Center. The project engages with technology providers Alteryx, Mapbox, DataBlick, Twilio, DigitalGlobe, Slalom and Exasol, in order to track and map the spread of the disease and empowers coordinators to allocate resources across the country accordingly. It ultimately prevents outbreaks from cascading. View More