Chanjoplus

Reaching the unreached children with lifesaving vaccines through digital identification.

A key barrier that prevents the distribution of lifesaving vaccines to children 0-5 years especially in low resource settings has been lack of proper identification and registration mechanisms. Tens of millions of children have no formal record of their existence — especially those living in remote, impoverished or vulnerable communities. 

Majority of these children however enjoy the custody of a parent, a relative(grandfather/mother, aunt, uncle ,cousin) or worst case scenario at least a community health volunteer .With basic mobile penetration in Kenya alone at 97%,there’s a 95% chance that a relative and or community health worker associated with every child owns a basic mobile phone, and for every mobile phone there is, a Government Identity was used to acquire the sim card.

We see an opportunity to connect every child to an existing relative’s Government issued identity card through a USSD platform that then enables a randomized unique identity number allotment for every registered child and thereby empowering the health workers and caregivers  through the digital identity for the child with details on which vaccinations were given to the registered children, when and where they were given. These records can then be pulled up by any public clinic making it easy to identify which children are falling through the immunisation gaps and provide real-time data on vaccination drives.

The chanjoplus USSD design observes the minimal data collection principle, requiring health volunteers to only capture the caregivers’ Name, Government issued identity number and phone number. For the child, only two biographics are captured; the name and date of Birth, which the database then uses to schedule subsequent sessions for immunization. The registered caregiver has to authenticate access to the child’s immunization records through an opt-in SMS every time a  hospital facility requires access for updates ,and or inspection of the child immunization records. This empowers the caregiver to have control over who can access his/her child records and enhancing transparency over who accesses the data. Uses information compiled by community health workers to build a digital identity for each child, with details on which vaccinations were given and when and where they were given.

Chanjoplus uses a USSD technology to create a randomized unique digital identity for every child. This means that even where the child lacks formal registration, we still have a digital identity for that child using the randomized digital number.

The child’s caregiver is empowered to give access through an sms opt in service for access to the child health records either for updates. The sms uses a two-factor authentication for I’d number  as well as a unique pin given during registration. 

The chanjoplus API is designed to integrate to any central database making it inter-operable with existing registration systems.

1.The chanjoplus USSD design observes the minimal data collection principle, requiring health volunteers to only capture the caregivers’ Name, Government issued identity number and phone number. For the child, only two biographics are captured; the name and date of Birth, which the database then uses to schedule subsequent sessions for immunization. 

2. Chanjoplus provides transparency regarding who has accessed the caregiver and her/his child’s  data and for what purpose; through a two factor authentication for access ,updates and or inspection .The caregiver by way of an sms opt-in puts his/her id number and the pin issued to them during registration to enable this authentication. The cost of this authentication and registration is free to the caregiver .

The choice of USSD and sms means that the chanjoplus platform can be accessed in very remote ,poor connectivity and poor resource settings  on a basic feature phone thereby enhancing access to a wider reach of caregivers and their children .

Our solution design is a highly customizable and highly inter-operable system.Our API's can easily be integrated onto any existing digital identification systems with very minimal customization required such as the format of government issued identity numbers in different regions and or governments. Since our initial identifier for the caregiver is a Government issued identity number,which we then use to generate a random unique digital identity for the registered child,this means our solution can be incorporated onto any digital identification anywhere in the world

Incorporation of our solution onto digital identification systems only requires our API access points and documentation which is a global best practice standard procedure for integration of API'S.

We provide open API's and documentation for interoperability that allows for data portability and thereby prevents vendor-lock in.We are also in the process of acquiring open source licenses to enable sharing of our source code in order to increase our impact especially to the lives of children we serve by enabling public access to our source code .

Our solution leverages the Use of USSD and standard sms getaway making it accessible in areas with low connectivity on a simple basic feature phone.

On low literacy and numeracy levels,we have incorporated existing community health volunteers who are based within the communities to train users on the simple two step authentication and can also assist with registration of users onto our platform. This can be done in a local language setting to account for low literacy.

Our future plan involves use of simple voice recognition technology embedded on a sim card to allow for voice authentication.

In three years we plan to have a sustainable model by increasing our infant reach to 50,000 children

Our focus is targeted at three regions in Kenya for the first three years with an estimated population of 109,000 infants at a 55% penetration.

Our Sustainable scaling strategy is informed by partnerships with Governments,NGO´s and the private sector so as to increase our Infant Reach and clinic roll-out .Partnering with N.G.O's will enable us penetrate the local communities where they already have working structures with the local health ecosystem; community health workers, local administrative units as well as clinics .

We are currently piloting the solution in partnership with Amref Health Africa. Amref has one of the largest network of community health worker base and as such the partnership gives us access to the network of community health workers who help us register caregivers and children at the household level within communities.

We have a diverse team of 5 with a wealth of experience ranging from software engineers with over 12 years’ experience in software development; having deployed projects with: VB.NET, C#, MSSQL, MySQL; Google Maps, Facebook and Twitter APIs; PHP, Java, Python, Django; Typescript, JavaScript, HTML5, CSS3, Bootstrap. We have business development experts as well as finance and legal experts in the team.

The team is driven by the passion to make a significant contribution to the lives of vulnerable children by using technology to better identify and protect children from vulnerability brought about by inequities in distribution of vaccines. 

Our sustainability model is driven by ad revenue targeting child-related brands .We intend to offer brand related ads on behalf of child related brands to our users at a fee by way of targeted content.

Our work is guided by the mission to provide digital identity to vulnerable children in low resource settings in a bid to enable their families have an equal access to critical services such as health services and thus giving them greater control over their personal data .This we believe will not only contribute to the realization of the SDG’s but overall social,health and economic benefits.

The mission Billion challenge will enhance our work by enabling visibility to our brand, to potential investors and partners, accelerating the funding as well as providing mentorship and expert support from the World bank staff.

Some of the key barriers especially working with Governments is the question of regime change .Change of regimes comes at a cost where continuation of certain projects are put to a halt depending on political promises of the politicians.

To overcome this,we hope to work with Partners like the world bank to influence policy changes that would ensure continuation of projects through anchorage in law .