WHY SPACE MATTERS
Health services
According to data from the World Health Organization, the doctor-to-population ratio for countries hit the hardest by the pandemic is 1:5,000 in Sierra Leone, and 1:10,000 in Liberia.
Not only do NASA’s advances in telemedicine enable the efficient handling of medical emergencies in space, this technology has the capability to better provide underserved areas with quality health care services. Telemedicine has proved to be cost-effective and less labor-intensive. Avanti, a satellite operator based in the UK, worked with the government in Niger to provide expert care in remote communities. Inmarsat, another telecommunications company, connected remote clinics in Benin to urban hospitals in order to to take advantage of their diagnostic expertise. In addition to diagnoses, surgeons will soon perform medical procedures thousands of miles away from the patient - through robotic equipment. Already, AdEchoTech developed MELODY, the first remote ultrasound solution, based on 10 years of space medicine research on the tele-ultrasound.
Ongoing collaboration between the satellite industry and healthcare providers is critical to providing expert telemedicine worldwide. Space matters because satellites save lives.
