1

IMPROVING SECTORS OF THE SOCIETY WITH ICT: E-HEALTH, E-EDUCATION, E-JOURNALISM AND E-GOVERNMENT

BY

ADEYANJU, IBRAHIM ADEPOJU B.Tech, M.Sc., PhD, MACM, MIEEE, MIAENG, SMIACSIT, SMUACEE

E-Mail: adepojuib@yahoo.com/+2348132876689

AND

OLORUNTOYIN, SEFIU TAIWO B.Tech, MIAENG, MIACSIT, MCPN, MIEEE, MSAB, MUACEE

E-Mail: oloruntoyin86@gmail.com/+2348051922105

DEPARTMENT OF COMPUTER SCIENCE AND ENGINEERING LADOKE AKINTOLA UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY,

P.M.B 4000, OGBOMOSO, OYO STATE, NIGERIA

2

Abstract

The information and communication technology (ICT) revolution has created opportunities in many sectors of the society, including e-health, e-education, e-journalism, and e- government. Over the past decade, new applications of ICT have improved service delivery, transparency, and public access in each of these areas. This paper highlights some of the ways that ICT can enhance different sectors of the society such as health care, education, journalism and government. The aim is to enlighten professionals, especially those in the developing countries such as Nigeria, in these sectors about the benefits of ICT and how to cope with its challenges.

Keywords: ICT, e-Education, e-Government, e-Health, e-Journalism

1.0 Introduction

Information and Communication Technology (ICT) can assist people by improving their access to health care, education and government irrespective of geographic or income barriers (Hilbert, 2012). Such access can enhance knowledge, break down barriers to participation, and improve the accountability of public or private institutions to its people or shareholders (Mansell, 1999, Heeks and Moller, 2009). These potential advancements will be especially beneficial to individuals in poor and developing communities around the world such as Nigeria.

In this paper, we look at some of the ways that ICT is being utilised in different sectors of the society and attempt to address some of the challenges that dissuade its use in developing economies. We start our work with a critical look at e-Health in Section 2. This is then followed by a discussion of the potential benefits of ICT in education, journalism and media, and government in Sections 3 to 5. Section 6 discusses concerns about the use of ICT while our conclusion appear in Section 7.

2.0 Electronic Health care

The use of ICT in health care sector is popularly known electronic health (e-Health). This has enhanced access to all forms of health care (primary, community, surgery, mental, gynaecology etc) by helping in rapid dissemination of information concerning the prevention and control of emerging infectious diseases, providing remote interaction between patient and medical experts and also led to improved responses to outbreak situations (Spence and Smith, 2009). Efforts to contain outbreaks of dangerous infectious diseases require the rapid collection and transmission of detailed patient data to medical labs or public health centres. Health care professionals need tools to communicate important scientific or epidemiological findings to other parts of the health care community. ICT has and is still enhancing capacity in this vital sector of every economy.

Many health problems in developing countries are being addressed using ICT (Adigun et al, 2006). Digital records and images utilizing digital cameras have made it possible for doctors around the world to share information or offer advice on treatments for complicated ailments. For example, using Internet connections, doctors working in remote regions of Africa during an outbreak of an epidemic will be able to transmit their findings to experts at the World Health Organization in Geneva, Switzerland as well as the centres for disease control in Atlanta, USA. Before the arrival of the Internet, transferring detailed information of this kind

3

could take as long as two weeks. In such conditions, when the rapid dissemination of information is vital to treating infected persons and containing an outbreak, ICT can provide tools for an efficient outbreak response. Public health officials are also using new technologies to study the impact of health interventions and to target disease prevention programmes. For example, health agencies have used satellite-based global positioning systems (GPS) to monitor the spread of West Nile virus in the United States (Jean et al, 2007). Data collection and monitoring technologies such as that use in monitoring the West Nile virus increase the information available to public health officials when they make important health policy decisions.

Applications of ICT in e-Health enables patients to have access to their medical records from any location via secured Internet sites (Eichelberg et al, 2005). Readily available medical records will help ensure that individuals receive appropriate care when travelling or changing medical institutions. Also, new devices that are able to determine the chemical content of blood when placed on top of the skin can be used by diabetes patients. Another possible application is the use of a simple digital watch incorporated into a pill bottle-cap to record the time and date when the bottle was opened. This will allow medical personnel to monitor the use of medication by patients.

3.0 Electronic Education

ICT can improve educational opportunities by enabling educators and students to overcome barriers of distance as well as enhancing the content of instructional materials. The use of ICT to deliver lessons or training from instructors in one location to students in another is known as distance learning (Perraton, 2000). Distance learning has allowed people, including disabled (Watkins, Tokareva & Turner, 2011), to listen to recordings of classroom lectures or other educational presentations, and millions of people have watched educational programmes from different television stations.

Both the emergence of the Internet and new developments in educational software have vastly enhanced distance education over the past decade. The geographic reach of distance education has been extended. There has been a substantial increase in the quantity and diversity of educational material available over the Internet or through the use of satellite video and audio linkups. Computers and Internet connections have been widely deployed in classrooms, from pre-nursery levels through to the university level. Lessons delivered through computers can be interactive, which gives students real-time feedback on their work and enables them to work at their own pace. Kids often enjoy working with computers, so when they are intelligently integrated into classrooms, computers can create excitement about learning among students. The Internet provides an extraordinary opportunity for students to extend the reach of their learning. Before the Internet, the resources available to students were largely those that could be found in their classrooms, in their outdated textbooks or in public libraries. The Internet enables students to reach well beyond the physical confines of their classrooms and gain access to virtually unlimited quantities of information on the topics or events they are discussing in their classrooms. The use of the Internet for school assignments also encourages students to give free rein to their curiosity and strengthens their research and investigative skills.

ICT offers valuable educational opportunities, especially for poor people in developing countries. Students and other residents of poor countries are increasingly using the Internet, often in community Internet centres, to gain access to information and communicate via e-

4

mail. Doctors, scientists, and other professionals can achieve cheap or free access to journals and other professional publications that are too expensive to afford in hard-copy versions. Government aid agencies, foundations, and private firms sponsor numerous distance education programs designed to teach skills to a wide variety of professionals, government officials, engineers, scientists, and entrepreneurs. Internet or satellite connections enable students from developing countries to take courses offered in foreign institutions. In these and other ways, technology-enabled educational programmes can help strengthen the future leaders of developing countries in all spectre of life including social welfare, economy, and politics (Viswanathan & Blom, 2010). Improved technology and the accessibility of open source projects have also improved education. On average, traditional textbooks are updated once every five years, making a lot of the information within their fields outdated by the time it gets to the end user through the schools' libraries. Editors and publishers are weary of constantly putting out new editions of books because the cost of reprinting is cumbersome. For students, the price of purchasing textbooks adds to their financial burdens and can often lead to people dropping out of school because the cost of some books are higher than the tuition fee at some community colleges.

Open source materials fill this gap and fix the flaw of outdated textbooks by providing free material that can be accessed anytime via the Internet. The “Open Education” revolution offers print-on-demand articles and the possibility of using legal material and incorporating new changes, and even tailored material for individual students. Sixteen (16) colleges including Harvard University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology have started the option of allowing students to enrol on “Open Courses” that are open to the public. All class materials are uploaded online, along with video and/or audio files of lectures. Although the course selection is still relatively limited, it is beginning to take shape on other campuses around the United States. Open courses will hopefully help break down barriers of socioeconomic factors and the hierarchy of schooling to provide everyone the opportunity to learn from top institutions.

4.0 Electronic Journalism and Media

The technological revolutions of the Internet have ushered in a new age of journalism that cannot be confined to one medium or one platform of exchange. It has made publishing and accessing news articles easier and cheaper with more varied sources and opinions (White et al, 1984, Prasad, 2009). The Internet offers unlimited space to whoever chooses to partake, unlike television programmes and news articles that are confined by word count limitations and air time restrictions. The relative ease with which information spreads creates an interactive playground for users whose number continues to grow over time.

In the late 1980s, Cable News Network (CNN1) began offering 24-hour news coverage that affected political discourse and public opinion, producing what is now known as the “CNN Effect”. Around-the-clock reporting took news to the next level beyond the daily newspapers and weekly or monthly magazines. Yet, the CNN effect seems limited compared to the possibilities of the Internet. Not only is national and international news available within minutes of the events happening, but there are also more news sources to choose from than just CNN. The perspective of International reporters, journalists and other citizens across different continents are open to the public through news media websites, blogs, product reviews on e-Commerce websites etc.

1 www.cnn.com

5

Greater dependence on the web has sparked various trends relating to the collection of news stories. First, newspapers are turning more readily to news agencies for efficient news coverage. This can be seen with the growth of news agencies such as The Associated Press (AP), which creates and distributes content to registered members and subscribers in over 121 countries. With over 1,700 newspapers and 5,000 television and radio broadcasters reprinting their stories and images daily, it is no surprise that more than half of the world’s population sees AP news on any given day, according to their website2. Another trend is the emergence of news conglomeration websites that bring together stories from a variety of sources including AP and other nationally-based papers. For example, the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) News3 arm amasses its stories from over 4,000 sites. Popular web search engines, such as Google and Yahoo!, can also be seen as very large news-gathering sites. These search engines do not only index news stories for searching but also index the contents of online commentaries, surveys, reviews and blogs.

Many studies have shown that the Internet is becoming increasingly popular as a news source. According to Pew Research Center4, fifty-four percent (54%) of voting age Americans used the Internet to get political news and information and to email others to discuss the 2010 midterm elections. During the 2008 and 2012 presidential elections, the use of the internet reached unprecedented levels. The Obama campaign, utilized the internet as acommunication, information and outreach platform in an unparalleled fashion. The Pew study also found that people were no longer as dependent upon television and local news for information. For example, within a "high-powered" group of Internet users, defined as those who use broadband four or more times a day, seventy-one percent (71%) go online for news on an average day, while fifty-nine percent (59%) get news from local TV, about half from national TV and radio, and forty percent (40%) from local newspapers.

Table 1: Generational divide in source of National and International News (Source: Associated Press)

The generational gap also show differences in where people turn to for news. In a research conducted by the Associated Press2, it was found that younger consumers get news from a variety of sources such as stories passed along by e-mail, social networking sites, and text messaging. Table 1 reflects the divergences among the age demographics in regards to how they are informed of national and international news. The Internet is the most popular source for the 18-29 years age group; while the 30years and above age group prefers local television and cable news.

2 www.ap.org

3 www.bbc.co.uk/news

4 www.pewresearch.org

6

5.0 E- Government

ICT can enhance interactions between citizens and their governments in several ways. The use of ICT in government, sometimes called "e-government," can enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of government services. E-government can also help achieve other important goals of good governance, such as accountability and transparency (Kushchu & Kuscu, 2003, Mohammed et al, 2010, Grima-Izquierdo, 2010). In democratic societies, information on government activities should be readily available for review by the public. Prior to the emergence of computer databases, the Internet and other IT innovations, large quantities of government documents were not easily accessible to most citizens. Using these technologies, governments today can provide citizens with fast and free access to a wide variety of documents and records.

Access to official information is critical to ensuring that governments are accountable to citizens, that they are responsive to citizens and that they are diligently carrying out their statutory responsibilities (Koh & Prybutok, 2003, Cordella, 2007). The capacity to track government budget expenditures, for example, enables taxpayers to ensure that governments are trustworthy stewards of the funds entrusted to them. ICT can also provide mechanisms through which governments can interact with citizens. Government websites can provide quick access to information on building regulations, motor vehicle licenses, or immunizations. Information and Communication Technology can also improve the performance and efficiency of government bureaucracies and enhance inter-agency cooperation. In these ways, technology can strengthen the delivery of government services. For instance, in India, an e-governance initiative is being implemented to improve citizen access to public services and increase the transparency of government transactions.

6.0 Concerns of the ICT age

The preceding sections have highlighted ways in which new information technologies are improving the quality of people's lives. In this section, we look at some of the leading concerns that have been raised with respect to the growth of ICT. Information Technology is rapidly creating a knowledge economy, in which productivity and prosperity will increasingly come to depend on access to information and on the ability to make productive use of it.

Nevertheless, the great promise of ICT to improve the quality of lives carries other implicit risks with it. A major concern is that gaps in ICT access will reinforce and perhaps even widen existing disparities in living standards across communities. Access to new ICT, and therefore to knowledge, varies widely within countries and between countries. The promises that information technology provides require access to and knowledge of the new technology itself. Without one or the other, the ICT might not be used to its maximum potential.

The broad variations in ICT accessibility could lead to the exclusion of large numbers of people from the benefits of its knowledge. As knowledge critical to enhancing social welfare and economic opportunity increasingly come to depend on ICT, these gaps in access to technology, frequently called "digital divides," will reinforce national and international gaps in living standards.

7.0 Conclusion

7

Advancement in ICT is producing many changes in our society at incredible speeds. The shifts within the job market, the rise of open source materials, and the rethinking of firms will bring about new trends in business. ICT provide more efficient ways to handle health care and education material will provide access, flexibility, and coverage to more people than ever. ICT also enable efficient production projects and comprehensive news coverage that is increasingly being streamlined to become an integral part of the expansion of communication across cultures, communities, states, countries and continents.

However, the rapid expansion of information and communication technology also bears certain costs. Workers in sectors such as agriculture and manufacturing are losing their jobs as innovations in ICT. Such innovations create a greater demand for high-tech workers and introduce efficiencies that make manual labour obsolete. Furthermore, governmental programmes do not provide the assistance needed to help these workers transition to the ICT age, further wedging the gap between rural and urban communities. This disparity is also magnified within the stratification of countries. The digital divide that exists among developed and developing countries is obvious and the high cost of bringing modern ICT to third-world countries is an issue that needs to be solved.

References

Adigun, M.O., Emuoyibofarhe O.J., Ojo, S.O. and Dehinbo J (2006), e-Health Management: A partnership and collaboration model in developing countries, Proceedings of the 1st All Africa Technology Diffusion Conference, Johannesbourg, South Africa.

Cordella, A. (2007), E-government: towards the e-bureaucratic form?, Journal of Informatics on Technology, 22, 265–274.

Eichelberg, M., Aden, T., Riesmeier, J., Dogac, A. and Laleci, G. (2005), A survey and analysis of electronic healthcare record standards, ACM Computing Surveys, 20, 1-47.

Grima-Izquierdo, C. (2010), A generic architecture for e-Government and e-Democracy: requirements, design and security risk analysis, LAP Publishing.

Heeks, R. and Molla, A. (2009), Impact Assessment of ICT-for-Development Projects: A Compendium of Approaches, Development Informatics: Working Paper Series, Development Informatics Group, University of Manchester, UK.

Hilbert, M. (2012), Towards a conceptual framework for ICT for Development: lessons learned from the Latin American "cube framework", Information Technologies and International Development, Special Issue: ICT4D in Latin America.

Jean, C.M., Honarmand, S., Louie J.K. and Glaser, C.A. (2007), Risk factors for West Nile Virus Neuroinvasive Disease, Emerging Infectious Disease, 13(12).

Koh, C.E., Prybutok, V.R. (2003), The three-ring model and development of an instrument for measuring dimensions of e-government functions. Journal of Computer Information Systems, 33(3), 34–39.

Kushchu, I. and Kuscu, M.H. (2003), From e-Government to m-Government: Facing the Inevitable, Proceedings of The 3rd European Conference on e-Government, 253–260.

8

Mansell, R. (1999) Information and communication technologies for development: assessing the potential and the risks. Telecommunications policy, 23 (1), 35-50.

Mohammed, S., Abubakar, M.K., Bashir, A. (2010), e-Government in Nigeria: a catalyst for national development, Proceedings of the 4h International conference on development studies, University of Abuja, Nigeria .

Perraton, H. (2000), Open and Distance Learning in the Developing World. Routledge Publishers, London, UK

Prasad, K. (Ed.) (2009), e-Journalism: New Media and News Media, B.R. Publishing Corporation, New Delhi, India.

Spence, R. and Smith, M. (2009), Information and Communication Technologies, Human Development, Growth and Poverty Reduction: A Background Paper, Second Harvard Forum - A Dialogue on ICTs, Human Development, Growth and Poverty Reduction, 256-267.

Viswanathan, D., and Blom, J. (2010), New Metaphors from Old Practices- Mobile Learning to Revitalize Education in Developing Regions of the World, IEEE Transactions On Learning Technologies, 3 (1), 18–23.

Watkins, A., Tokareva, N. and Turner, M. (2011), ICTs in Education for people with disabilities: Review of innovative practice, UNESCO Institute for Information Technologies in Education, Moscow, Russia.

White, T., Meppen, A.J. and Young, S. (1984), Broadcast News, Reporting & Production, Macmillan Press, NY, USA.

BIOGRAPHIES OF AUTHORS

9

ADEYANJU Ibrahim Adepoju, (adepojuib@yahoo.com/08132876689) received Bachelor of Technology in Computer Engineering with First Class Honours at Ladoke University of Technology (LAUTECH), Ogbomoso, Nigeria, a Master of Science in Computing: Information Engineering and Doctor of Philosophy (Computing) from the Robert Gordon University, Aberdeen , UK. He did his Post -Doctoral Fellowship at the IDEAS Research Institute, Robert Gordon University, Aberdeen, UK. He was a recipient of the Stephen Awokoya Foundation for Science Education in Nigeria Postgraduate Scholarship (2005), Petroleum Technology Development Fund (PTDF) Overseas Scholarship (2006), PhD Research Studentship by Northern Research Partnership/ UK-India Education & Research Initiative (2007) and Scottish Overseas

Research Students Award Scheme (ORSAS) in 2009. He is currently a lecturer in the Department of Computer Science & Engineering, Ladoke Akintola University of Technology, Ogbomoso, Nigeria. His research interests are in the field of Information Systems and Retrieval, Cased Based Reasoning, Distributed Constraints Satisfaction, Machine Learning and other Artificial Intelligence research areas. He is a member of several professional associations including the Association of Computing Machinery (ACM), the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), International Association of Engineers (IAENG), International Association of Computer Science and Information Technology (IACSIT) and Universal Association of Computer & Electronics Engineers (UACEE). He has attended and presented at many workshops, seminars and conferences both at local and International levels. He has published many articles in reputable national and International journals with co-authors across different continents.

OLORUNTOYIN Sefiu Taiwo, (oloruntoyin86@gmail.com /08051922105 ) received Bachelor of Technology in Computer Engineering at Ladoke Akintola University of Technology Ogbomoso, Nigeria and Certified in Google Smart Searcher with Distinction from Google, USA. His research interests are in the field of Mobile Computing, Mobile E-service and TeleMedicine/Artificial Intelligence. He was a recipient of Outstanding Certificate of Achievement Award by Euppendoph Resource Nigeria, Honorary International Membership Award by World Society of Interdisciplinary Anti-Aging Medicine (WOSIAM), Paris and The GNT Nigeria I.T certification Training Scholarship Award Winner (2008 and 2009 respectively). He is a member of the Computer Professional (Registration Council of Nigeria) (CPN), Network and System

Professional Association (NaSPA), Nigeria Computer Society (NCS), International Association of Engineers (IAENG), International Association of Computer Science and Information Technology (IACSIT), Universal Association of Computer & Electronics Engineers (UACEE), India and IEEE Computer Society. He has attended many workshops, seminars and conference both at local and national. He has many articles to his credits in reputable national and International journals.