Plans to launch a mobile platform for young South Africans to access health tips and useful information are in the pipeline, as the Department of Health takes its promotion of healthy lifestyles a step forward.
Plans to launch a mobile platform for young South Africans to access health tips and useful information are in the pipeline, as the Department of Health takes its promotion of healthy lifestyles a step forward.
Health Minister, Dr Aaron Motsoaledi, said he would use the mobile platform to interact with young people and field health or departmental related questions, and invite health experts from various fields of medicine to do the same.
The minister was interacting with journalism students from the Cape Peninsula University of Technology and the University of Cape Town at the Imbizo Centre, Parliament, on Thursday.
Last August the department launched MomConnect, a mobile service where pregnant moms are helped to keep track and updated about the health of their unborn infant.
He said the mobile platform, called “Be Wise”, was part of the department’s efforts to promote healthy lifestyles in an innovative way.
“We are going to launch one for you, for the youth, somewhere this month.
We are going to give you access to information about health. “You can communicate with me any time through that platform.
You can get experts who are worried about Nyaope, about dagga, about your future. We are worried about teenage pregnancy, we are worried about abortions,” he said.
The minister was responding to a question on the use of mobile technology in the health sector.
Minister Motsoaledi said while the department had embraced the use of technology to promote efficiency, he cautioned against phasing out clinical consultations in favour of innovation.
He said the health sector should not be trapped into over-using new technologies and replacing it with the art of medicine.
The Minister said the MomConnect mobile service had received over 3 000 compliments from pregnant mothers since it was launched in August.
He said this showed that it was having a good impact on many pregnancies.
– SAnews.gov.za
