Apostolos Alissandratos of the Australian National University in Australia will develop a biotechnology platform for the low-cost production of simple, just-add-water diagnostic tests for the early detection of infectious diseases in resource-limited settings. Diagnosis of infectious diseases generally involves detecting pathogen-specific nucleic acids in human samples, which requires unstable reagents, costly procedures, and skilled workers. They have engineered a safe bacterium that produces the biochemical reagents needed to detect the pathogenic nucleic acids as an extract. They will develop a method to freeze-dry this extract so that it is stable at room temperature, simplifying production and storage, and a protocol for incorporating it into a reaction mixture that only requires the addition of water to an individual tube for a diagnostic polymerase chain reaction. They aim to reduce the cost per test by at least 100-fold, and will evaluate their approach for detecting a malaria-causing pathogen.

Bernard Appiah of Texas A&M School of Public Health in the U.S. will produce a one-hour community radio program to be aired twice per week comprising a 10-minute radio drama serial on infant vaccines, a 10-minute panel discussion by community health workers, and a 30-minute phone-in by listeners, to improve on-time childhood vaccinations in Ethiopia. In 2016, on-time and full immunization coverage in Ethiopia was only achieved for 39% of children between one and two years of age, despite long-term efforts to improve it. One of the main reasons for this was lack of communication with mothers about immunizations. To address this, they will harness the popularity of community radio in Ethiopia. They will engage mothers, community health workers, and radio actors to help design a radio drama incorporating relevant topics on childhood immunizations, and train 20 health workers to be part of radio panel discussions. They will air the radio program for six months in two districts, and determine its impact on timely immunization coverage in a selected cohort of mothers with infants.

Jerome Ateudjieu of Meillerur Acces aux Soins de Sante in Cameroon will test whether training community volunteers to record demographic movements and monitor births and immunizations of residents and visitors in their villages can improve timely childhood vaccination coverage in Cameroon. Many health districts in Cameroon have reported outbreaks of vaccine-preventable diseases. One underlying cause is that many people in these regions travel extensively, making it difficult for health facilities to identify newborns that need vaccinating, and to inform parents when and where the necessary vaccinations can be received. They will select 60 villages in the Noun Health District of West Cameroon, and train community volunteers to record the movements and immunization status of infants up to 11 months in their village. These records will be sent by the WhatsApp mobile messaging application to the relevant health facility to identify the children eligible for the next immunization session. The necessary appointments will then be communicated back to the parents by the community worker, who will also inform them of the importance of timely immunization, and encourage pregnant mothers to give birth in health facilities.

Manish Bhardwaj of Innovators in Health in India will build a social networking platform consisting of voice messages accessed via mobile phone that is monitored by community health workers to connect small groups of young pregnant women and new mothers in India. Currently, community health workers provide home visits to help adolescent mothers combat mental health disorders. However, their capacity is limited. An additional difficulty for adolescent mothers is the lack of social networks caused by moving to new neighborhoods to live with their husbands. Social networks can protect against mental health disorders by providing peer support and the relevant knowledge and experience to overcome any challenges. They will trial their approach in a rural area in India and recruit young mothers with no access to mental health care into specified social groups. Each group will be associated with trained community health workers who provide additional support to the mothers, and manage the messages and posts.