In late 2019, the first COVID-19 outbreak appeared in Wuhan, China. Since then, COVID-19 has had severe health and economic consequences and exposed the fragility of global health systems. The ubiquity of Digital Health in the response to COVID-19 has quickly become recognised, with telemedicine at the forefront of this trend.

Following our recent report funded and supported by DFID UK, Digital Health: A health system strengthening tool for developing countries, we hosted a webinar, convening insights from some of the leading experts in Digital Health in emerging markets.

Key takeaways:

• The pandemic has magnified existing weaknesses and gaps in health systems, particularly related to insufficient facilities, finance and human resources infrastructure.
• Focus on COVID-19 has left other healthcare needs overlooked. Disruption of existing health care services due to lockdowns and hysteria has left patients with existing health issues, like diabetes, neglected and unable to seek treatment.
• Digital technology is gaining a lot of attention and legitimacy as patients more readily turn to digital solutions for healthcare. Advances in technology and its increasingly widespread use for healthcare are expected to outlive the pandemic due to a positive shift in patient behaviour towards its use. “The idea that you need to see a doctor in person, in order to trust the process, has been turned on its head”.
• Telemedicine in particular, as a means of primary healthcare (as the first point of contact for patients), has gained increased traction to screen patients in response to COVID-19.
• As digital health solutions set their eyes on scale, ensuring quality of healthcare providers and professionals, quality control of supporting technology, ensuring privacy of patient records and information will be key to providing responsible and safe healthcare.

Read the report to learn more about our research and stay tuned for more country-level research pieces on digital health.