Apps to foster responsible sexual behaviour among youth

Following the immense growth of technology globally, most young people in Kenya have made search engines and social media their directories for all matters including information on sexuality and reproductive health, research shows.

With most, being impressionable by nature, it has become imperative to ensure that the information they access is credible and that it will ultimately lead to cutting the high cases of HIV infections among the youth.

The urgency to act now is highlighted by government statistics which show that 98 teenagers are infected and 14 die each day as a result of HIV complications.

For this reason, the United Nations Population Fund partnered with start-up accelerator Nailab for their I Am campaign to promote innovations that address the challenge of access to information and services on sexual reproductive health for the youth.

A recent Kenya Youth Survey by the Aga Khan University’s East African Institute showed that 30 per cent of young people access the Internet at least for an hour and a majority go online through the mobile phones. Against this background, the partners opted to target the youth through mobile phone solutions.

“By using what young people are most comfortable with, it is much easier to provide information that debunks the myths that they rely on when it comes to matters sexuality,” Ms Josephine Mwangi Nailab head of communications told the Business Daily.

The I Am initiative applications closed last month with over 500 innovators signing up about 92 solutions, each meant to help the youth understand their sexuality and sexual reproductive health in environments where stigma is rife.

The 92 applications were then shortlisted to 10 whose founders had the opportunity to pitch to a panel of judges earlier this month. Below is their brief description.

Fluid Solutions came up with a mobile game that combines fun and education to pass the vital information. The app brings to life various theories and helps users form the right perceptions, allowing them to react and decide on the appropriate cause of action to take if the same was to happen to them in real life.

Another app Contraceptive SOS is designed to ease access to contraceptive for the sexually active youth who find it difficult to make their purchases at the pharmacy.

It allows condoms, contraceptives and pregnancy kits to be delivered on demand to college students, working on the same principle just like a taxi hailing app. In so doing, its developers hope to eliminate the risks that come with having unprotected sex.

My V-health on the other hand targets young women who hardly visit the gynaecologist. The women can use its vaginal wellness kit to know their health status. The pH test strip, part of the kit, once used is scanned using the app and the system auto-matches the readings and in case of abnormal readings it provides information about the likely causes, possible solutions and where need be, connects the user with a gynaecologist.

Ask Without Shame is not just a mere app, but combines an instant messaging service and USSD number to provide information to young people. The app allows curious youth to get information through their interactive platform where they can share concerns with medical specialists anonymously.

Bobea, developed by Health Index East Africa is an online system that aggregates the services and products offered by sexual health providers ranging from pharmacies, chemists, VCT, emergency providers and family planning centres complete with their exact geo-location.

Marie another gaming application contains a broad knowledge base which users can access by trying to answer the various quizzes.

Sophie Bot is an intelligent system that is loaded with verified information relays the same to its users through actual conversations that are driven either by text or voice chats. Its features integrated anonymous forums and digital chat bots built into the app that target social media users of Facebook, Telegram, Messenger and Twitter.

Smart Sex focuses on the attitudes, beliefs and behaviours that influence sexual health outcomes so as to reduce associated problems. Its creators provide information for initial diagnosis of sexually transmitted infections through their home testing kit complete with treatment options.

Deaf Elimu Plus Limited created a web and mobile based app that enables deaf youth users to search for specific sexual reproductive health information and words in Kenyan sign language, provide video content as well as incorporate a gaming and quiz aspect to the videos.

Imara TV is an online system that crowd sources and curates youth generated video content on human development, sexuality and identity and whose content is accredited by peer educators.

From the pool of 10 four social enterprises were picked and are currently undergoing a two- month training on business and product development along with start-up mentorship.

After this Fluid, Sophie Bot, Imara TV and Deaf Elimu, will present their further developed solutions to the public during an open day in November and be eligible to receive Sh1 million seed funding for each of them based on pre-agreed milestones.