Author: Philip Christian Zuniga

The Case for an Integrated Contact Tracing Ecosystem in the Philippines

Executive Summary:  Developing a national contact tracing system is one of the strategies adopted by countries to address the COVID-19 pandemic. With the decentralized nature of local government units (LGUs) in the Philippines, different LGUs have also been using various contact tracing applications. There is a need to integrate these multiple applications to streamline the…
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Standards and Interoperability in the Time of COVID-19

The world is currently facing unprecedented health, economic, and social crisis with the spread of COVID-19. Countries around the world are working round the clock in developing tools that can combat the virus. While many efforts are centered on health (e.g., vaccines, medicines, treatment protocols) and relief (e.g., providing food, helping the vulnerable population, supporting…
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Asia’s ICT Tools against COVID-19

The Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is an infectious disease caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). As of April 2020, it has infected at least 2.2 million people around the world, causing around 150,000 deaths. The disease has led countries to implement lockdowns and community quarantines to prevent further spread of the virus…
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Growth of Interoperability Labs in the Asia Pacific Region

In 2015, during a Regional Interoperability Meeting hosted by the Asia eHealth Information Network (AeHIN) in Manila, Philippines, representatives from ministries of health agreed that to attain full interoperability among health information systems, there is a need to form an interoperability lab in each country. A health interoperability laboratory is a facility focusing on the…
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