LIVE FROM GSMA-mHA MOBILE HEALTH SUMMIT 2012: Zachary Katz, Director of Diagnostic Services at CHAI (Clinton Health Access Initiative), today stressed the need for closer collaboration between the private and public healthcare sectors in an effort to drive mobile health services to the next level.

“The private sector, which is leading a lot of the mobile initiatives, and the public sector don’t always see eye to eye,” he told delegates during his keynote appearance. “We need to recognise these two groups aren’t necessarily out for the same thing and then we need to figure out how to bring them together. Private companies need to make a margin on this otherwise they will pull out. The question is, how can the public sector help them?”

He added: “The private sector is largely misunderstood by the public sector. There is often some dissonance between the receivers of drugs and the manufacturers of the drugs, instead of open information (such as understanding the market, understanding what patients want).”

CHAI is a global health organisation committed to strengthening integrated health systems in the developing world and expanding access to care and treatment for HIV/AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis.  Established in 2002 by President Clinton as the Clinton HIV/AIDS Initiative, CHAI has helped more than 4 million people gain access to the medicines needed for treatment, which represents nearly half of all the people living with HIV and on treatment in developing countries.

“We want to use mobile tools to increase access to care,” commented Katz. “We want people to get better more quickly and cheaply with mobile… As we move forward there are a number of quick wins we could see for mHealth – scale has not necessarily been achieved in many initiatives for mobile so far. In order for this market to be sustained we need to reach scale, learn and move on.”

Katz also outlined the successful work that CHAI has carried out with HP in Kenya, diagnosing HIV in infants. “The best collaborations and best products are produced by many,” he noted, urging further partnership work in the mHealth space.