The global need for health equity is receiving increased attention as new evidence reinforces the stark contrast in health outcomes from countries with varying levels of resources, according to AWS. 

AWS adds that findings from the World Health Organization's research on Social Determinants of Health noted a 19-year difference in life expectancy between developed countries and resource-constrained ones.

The reasons for life expectancy differences are:
  • complex transcending genetics
  • socioeconomic status
  • education, and
  • environmental conditions.

This is why health equity is not something that any one government or organisation can tackle alone, says AWS.

In 2021, the brand launched the AWS Health Equity Initiative, a three-year USD$40-million commitment to support organisations globally that are inventing and scaling new ways to promote equal access to health care and address social determinants of health.

In the initiative's first year, AWS awarded USD$14-million in cloud credits — credits for AWS's cloud services — and technical expertise to help nearly 90 organisations around the world. This ranged from startups to nonprofits and large enterprises to address this challenge.

"Closing the health equity gap will require new, better approaches to providing care — and our customers are doing just that. We're seeing organisations build innovative solutions tapping into the power of the cloud to deliver better health outcomes across the world," says Max Peterson, vice president of the worldwide public sector at AWS.

"Innovations range from a mobile technology-based taxi service for women in labour needing emergency care in Tanzania and Lesotho to genomic sequencing technology that is making it easier to address Covid-19 and other diseases in Africa," adds Peterson.

Peterson says, "The creativity of our customers, paired with AWS technology, has unlimited potential to substantially increase health equity; we're excited to see how much we can accomplish together."

Promoting equity through better diagnostics

AWS is now expanding the Health Equity Initiative to include a new focus area called diagnostics.

Despite their critical role in treatment, diagnostics are consistently overlooked and underfunded — particularly in addressing primary health care concerns — including diabetes and hypertension, says the brand.

Noncommunicable medical conditions account for 70% of deaths globally, with a disproportionate amount of these deaths occurring in low and middle-income countries.

Over the past two years, spurred by the pandemic, AWS has supported organisations using the cloud to power new diagnostic technologies to tackle Covid-19. Looking beyond the pandemic, sustained diagnostic innovation is needed across a wide range of diseases, and the new diagnostics focus area is designed to address that.

Hyrax Biosciences is an example of a company using the cloud to bring diagnostic treatments to low and middle-income countries. The South Africa-based bioinformatics software company is enabling the analysis of the Covid-19 genome to better understand and track the progress of the virus in Africa.

This allows national and international health authorities to:
  • monitor infections
  • quickly identify and understand new variants, and
  • take rapid action.

According to AWS, with support from the Health Equity Initiative, Hyrax is scaling its genomic sequencing technology to address other diseases, including HIV, tuberculosis and malaria — diseases that disproportionately affect individuals in developing countries.

"Next-generation sequencing data is both large scale and computation heavy. AWS allows us to process large amounts of raw genomic data in hours, not days or weeks. The faster we can identify the Covid-19 variants spreading in Africa, the more quickly we can understand the diversity of the disease across the continent and provide the right care to as many people as possible,” says Simon Travers, CEO of Hyrax Biosciences.

The new diagnostics pillar will be the Health Equity Initiative's fourth area of focus. The other three focus areas are:
  1. increasing access to health services
  2. addressing social determinants of health, and
  3. using data to promote equitable and inclusive systems of care.

Democratising access to care

Beyond diagnostics, AWS has also seen big steps forward in tackling inequalities in treatment and care. For example, Seattle-based startup Hurone AI is democratising access to high-quality cancer prevention and care.

The company is building artificial intelligence (AI)-powered applications, derived from data sources and algorithms from people of African descent, to bridge the gaps in cancer care outcomes.

According to AWS, oncologists are scarce in Africa. Estimates suggest that 10 to 20 oncologists in Rwanda serve a population of nearly 13 million. Hurone AI's Gukiza app enables oncologists to provide remote patient monitoring and 'teleoncology' throughout the country.

Powered by AWS, the Gukiza app allows oncologists to communicate with patients using digital devices and text messages, increasing the ability to provide care to more patients in more places.

"AWS is helping us safely and securely expand access to cancer care in Rwanda. Using the cloud, we are able to scale the Gukiza app, address the African cancer data gap and better support patients throughout their cancer treatment journey," says Kingsley Ndoh, founder and chief strategist at Hurone AI.

Ndoh adds, "By increasing treatment compliance and completion through Gukiza, we reduce costs from side effects-related hospitalisations and increase survival rates."

According to the brand, difficulties with accessing health services extend to primary medical care, as well. Emergency response personnel are frequently asked to provide support for nonurgent cases when a patient lacks transport or easy access to primary care.

Arizona-based eVisit is helping emergency personnel offer telehealth services, giving underserved populations access to the care they need without requiring an emergency visit to the hospital.

The platform says that access to the eVisit Virtual Care platform is available with a few taps on tablets carried by emergency medical technicians to facilitate live, on-site, telehealth visits between patients who call 911 and emergency medicine physicians.

"The cost and the ability to get to a point-of-care facility can be real challenges for vulnerable and underserved groups, and telehealth can play a critical role in bridging that gap. Our Virtual Care platform is designed to make it easy for emergency personnel to get patients the help they need and avoid unnecessary trips to the hospital," adds Juli Stover, chief strategy officer at eVisit.

Stover concludes, "Running our solution on AWS and the support from the Health Equity Initiative programme have allowed us to scale, helping us to get more people the help they need when they need it."

It's still day one

The brand says that great work is underway, but more work must be done to close the health equity gap.

AWS adds that it will continue to support customers using the power of the cloud to tackle this important global challenge. The brand encourages organisations around the world from startups to nonprofits and large organisations — and beyond — to apply on the AWS Health Equity Initiative page.

For more information, visit www.aws.amazon.com. You can also follow AWS on Facebook or on Twitter.