Malawi’s government, in partnership with UNICEF, has started an experiment exploring ways to reduce the time it takes to test for HIV.

This program comes in a time of great need, with an estimated 1.1 million people in Malawi infected with HIV these drones could help test thousands of children with HIV in a much more efficient time frame.

In an interview with Angela Travis, Chief of Communication for UNICEF Malawi said of the program “This programme started with the context we have in Malawi which is a country that still has 10 percent of its population HIV positive. That also extends to children, especially infants. Now for infants it is really critical if they are HIV positive, they are put on treatment straight away … The majority of them will die before their second birthday if they are not on treatment. So that was really where UNICEF came from and we were looking at ways where we could shorten the time between testing of these infants and delivery of results”.

The goal is to use the drones to transport medical tests and blood samples from rural clinics to laboratories at a much quicker rate than is currently possible. Right now it takes around 11 days for a sample to get from a health center to a lab for testing and can take up to two months for results to be delivered.

Transporting the samples by air not only promises to drastically improve turn-around times but also stands to decrease fuel costs and make delivery a lot more reliable. The road in Africa can often be difficult with many potential challenges. The high cost of fuel and poor state of the roads have all contributed to the extreme delays.

This is one of the steps the government is taking to assure the people it is committed to the prevention of HIV transmission.

“Malawi has pioneered a number of innovations in the delivery of HIV services including the Option B+ policy which puts mothers on a simple, lifelong treatment regime. We have also pioneered the delivery of results from the central laboratory to the health facilities through text messages. We believe our partnering with UNICEF to test UAVs is another innovation and will help in our drive to achieve the country’s goals in HIV prevention and treatment” said Minister of Health Dr. Peter Kumpalume.

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