Abstract
The COVID-19 pandemic has generated the greatest health crisis experienced in the 21st century, straining the capacity of health systems and posing an unparalleled challenge: how to make the health system efficient through the implementation and use of new information and communication technologies. The general objective of this chapter is to present the case of the Andalusian public health system and the use of information and communication technologies during the first stages of the pandemic with the aim of outlining some reflections and proposals for improvement in order to advance along the path of modernisation and digitalisation of the Andalusian public health system.
TopThe Effect Of Covid-19 Syndemia On The Health System
On 30 January 2020, after the different members of the World Health Organisation's (hereafter WHO) Emergency Committee reached agreement on the severity of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, the Director-General informed the international community that the disease constituted a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (hereafter PHEIC) with a high risk to global health (WHO, 2020). A few days later, the WHO determines - concerned about the alarming levels of spread of the virus and the severity of the disease, as well as the levels of government inaction on the situation - that the SARS-CoV-2 virus can be characterised as a pandemic. Months later, in March 2021, the virus had reached almost every corner and country in the world; and Europe began to experience the so-called “first pandemic wave”2:
Key Terms in this Chapter
Telemedicine: Aims to improve a patient's health by enabling real-time interactive communication between the patient and the remote physician or practitioner. This electronic communication involves the use of interactive telecommunications equipment including, as a minimum, audio and video equipment.
Health 2.0: Is the renewal of the traditional concept of Health, where new methods, means, tools and forms of communication improve the management of the process of monitoring people's health.
Digital Divide: Refers to the difference in access to and knowledge of the use of new technologies. It is often determined on the basis of different criteria, e.g., economic, geographical, gender, age or between different social groups.
ICT: Are the set of technologies developed today for more efficient information and communication, which have changed both the way of accessing knowledge and human relations.
Social Inequalities in Health: Systematic and potentially avoidable differences in one or more aspects of health across socially, economically, demographically or geographically defined populations or population groups.
COVID-19: Highly contagious respiratory disease caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus.
Syndemia: Is the sum of two or more concurrent or sequential epidemics or disease outbreaks in a population with biological interactions, which exacerbate the prognosis and burden of disease.
E-Patient: Is a term that has started to be used in eHealth, and refers to the patient or potential patient who uses health services using technological tools, feels committed to the management of their health on the same terms as a health professional, is at the same time a user of Web 2.0 tools and is able to manage health services and search for information through electronic communication tools.