“The solar powered community tablet brings information in image and digital format to remote communities where the population does not have access electric power, television, and internet” - Mestre Mario Moises Fonseca-UEM

The Pilot project on health promotion and awareness about the measures to prevent the COVID19 pandemic in rural areas using ICTs is an initiative of Kamaleon technology in partnership with the provincial health directorate and final year students of psychology and anthropology at Eduardo Mondlane University as part of a communal strategy to disseminate information and educate the masses about COVID19 preventive measures

Reaching out to rural communities, the initiative’s main purpose is to disseminate information about COVID 19 using a solar powered community tablet, a mechanism which aims at promoting digital literacy and civic education campaigns in communities believing that the use of ICTs and digital content can allow quick and effective dissemination of information

In the pilot phase alone, communities 320 people in the districts of Matutuine, Moamba, and Magude particularly those located far from the headquarters were reached. The campaign was vital in understanding the level of knowledge that remote communities have about the COVID19 pandemic and disseminating health promotion messages and COVID 19 preventive measures using the community tablet. Besides, clarification about the disease, ways of transmission, and preventive measures were made.

The COVID19 education digital campaign makes use of a solar powered giant community tablet to display videos with information about the pandemic whose contents were approved by the Maputo Province Executive Board (Maputo Province Health Directorate). During the campaigns the health team explains to participants who are placed in groups of 20 with a distance 1.5 metres from each other about how to use the tablet to obtain information about the pandemic. Activities conducted also include; demonstration of the correct way to wash hands, showing videos in Portuguese and the local language (Ronga) about COVID 19, and the distribution of homemade fabric masks

“The communities received the initiative with satisfaction because they received more information about the pandemic, its signs, symptoms, and means of prevention, as well as examples of the right way to wash hand”

Consequently, the community tablet was recognized as an asset to support the most disadvantaged communities owing to its ability to mitigate the spread of COVID 19 in the marginalized communities using solar powered technology.

“We recommend the use of the solar powered community tablet for other awareness activities in the health sector such as conducting mobile brigades, breast and cervical cancer screening, offering family planning methods information services, and the management and logistics of vaccines from a cold chain and the use of inbuilt facilities for interactivity such as online consultations and registration. ”----- Provincial Health Director, Dr. Daniel Arlindo Chemane, General Practitioner.