Belize City, Belize, December 2, 2021 (PAHO) – To enable proper electronic data collection and to support rapid response teams and surveillance, the Pan American Health Organization/World Health Organization (PAHO/WHO) donated 17 Samsung Galaxy tablets to the Ministry of Health and Wellness (MoHW) for use by contact tracers.
As we continue the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic, it is still crucial to capture every single COVID-19 case. Thus, the MoHW very innovatively started using Go.Data to capture cases from private health facilities and points of entry to Belize.
The Go.Data software, developed by WHO’s Global Outbreak Alert and Response Network (GOARN), was designed to facilitate faster and more accurate outbreak investigations during public health emergencies. The tool offers multiple functionalities for case investigation, contact follow-up, and visualization of chains of transmission.
The MOHW will install the app on the donated tablets to help ensure that country response teams can analyze and visualize the case and contact data in a timely manner. This will allow them to make informed decisions and identify evidence-informed public health response interventions.
The tablets will be distributed to 17 contact tracers who will be able to transition from the current manual data collection to electronic data collection.
PAHO/WHO continues to support surveillance and contact tracing activities in the country in response to the ongoing pandemic.
