Leading Ghanaian mobile value added service (VAS) provider, MobileContent is collaborating with telecoms market leader MTN Ghana and others to kick start a 24/7 mobile health (mHealth) service.

mHealth, according to the service provider is an affordable and a convenient health information and healthcare service for the most vulnerable in society.

The service, dubbed ‘Healthy You 247’, would in the next few weeks be available on Airtel and Vodafone as well. But for starters, it goes live on MTN from Wednesday October 21, on short code 247.

Healthy You 247 is a mHealth service stemming from the GSMA Mobile for Development initiative, which seeks to use digital technology platforms to make healthcare, education, and other service easily accessible to the most vulnerable in societies around the world.

The service basically puts health information and selected certified health personal at the disposal of subscribers 24/7 at the cost of 20Gp for every 3 minutes of direct interaction with a health professional in a language the subscriber understands.

But for now the service begins with on the SMS platform and it comes as four SMSs a week for only 10Gp.

The languages available for starters are English, Twi, Dagbani and Ewe, and by first quarter of next year, Ga and Hausa will be included.

The initial focus of the service would be maternal health, sexual reproductive health, family planning and nutrition information and support, but the portfolio will grow over time.

General Manager of MobileContent, Conrad Nyuur told Adom News the service is designed to take care of the anti-natal and post-natal periods of maternal health up to the first 1000 days of a newly born child's life.

He said apart from mobile telecom partners, other local and international organizations such as the Gramine Foundation and Audrey Pack are onboard to provide healthcare materials and products to clients free of charge.

"Audrey Pack for instance is providing a pack of maternal health products for each subscriber who registers as a maternal health patient. These packs will be made available at designated clinics across the country. The target is to reach one million people with the packs by first quarter next year," he said.

He said each pregnant woman is entitled to three of such packs within the anti-natal and post-natal period.

Gramine Foundation has also been working with the Ghana Health Service to authenticate the health professionals being used and the content for the platform. So far they have authenticated content that could last for at least four months.

Nyuur said they are also working with other organizations to ensure that drugs sold to subscribers of Healthy You 247 are authenticated and certified as safe to use.

He described the service as a hospital on mobile, saying it provides the platform for subscribers to listen to live health discussion once a week, record and retrieve health information and listen at one's leisure time, and record question and send for doctor to listen and send reply among other things.

"But it is not a substitute for see a doctor. The platform actually encourages direct consultation with your doctor when the need arises," he said.

Nyuur said the service would over time bring onboard health insurance packages from both the public and private sectors and give corporate Ghana a good reason to provide insurance cover for the vulnerable as part of their corporate social responsibility.

Another source of funding, according to him, would be a newly created SMS lottery game that would generate funds through the National Lottery Authority (NLA) specifically to support healthcare for the vulnerable.

"We are creating one big health ecosystem that makes both curative and preventive health as well as health insurance easily accessible just by the click of a button on the mobile phone," he said.

The service has a an initial life span of five years to take root and Ghana, and Nyuur said they plan on falling on the government's LEAP database to reach more vulnerable people, targeting at least 100,000 subscribers by December this year.

Whereas the service is targeted at the vulnerable and therefore totally free for LEAP candidates, it is also available to the general public. It is designed to be scaled up to other parts of Africa after it has taken root in country.