Nigeria’s Mobihealth International wins big at World Bank’s SDG award

Mobihealth International, an innovative telemedicine and digital healthcare platform, has emerged winner of the 2020 edition of the Global SDGS and Her competition, which is targeted at women in small and micro enterprises across the world. Mobihealth International was among the seven outfits led by women entrepreneurs that won the various categories of the award at the event.

Fu n m i Ad e w a r a , chief executive officer, Mobihealth International, received the award on behalf of the telemedicine and digital healthcare platform. Speaking on the award, the organisers noted that the recognition was an acknowledgment of the outstanding work of Adewara at the telemedicine start-up.

The competition, which is endowed by the World Bank Group and its partners – the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), UN Women and the Wharton School Zicklin Centre, held at the 75th United Nations General Assembly (UNGA), in New York City, United States of America on September 30, 2020.

Speaking at the award ceremony, Jill Wilkins, director, partnerships and practice groups (External and Corporate Relations) of the World Bank, noted that the competition showcases women entrepreneurs who support the global sustainable development goals (SDGS) through their business operations.

“The competition provides an opportunity to showcase women-led businesses that are not only supporting goals in health, food security, education, climate change, gender equality and industry, but alsodemonstratingresilience as they respond to the challenges of COVID-19,” Wilkins explained.

While receiving the award, Adewara expressed her joy at the recognition and thanked the organizers for finding her worthy of the coveted prize.

“I am i mmensely excited and thankful to the World Bank Group and its partners – the United Nations Development Program ( UNDP), UN Women and the Wharton School Zicklin Centre – who endowed the Global SDGS and Her Competition for women small and micro entrepreneurs and found me worthy of the honour of winning this year’s competition. Ordinarily, making it to the finals of this prestigious award alone is a great honour, particularly given the extraordinary strength of the entries this year. So, going further to win in such a strong competition is simply amazing,” Adewara said in her acceptance speech.

Trailing her journey to the award, the Mobihealth International CEO narrated her story to the audience on how her childhood experiences, and her desire to address some of the issues that placed the odds against her, had charted her course into medicine, and to establish a telemedicine company.

“The memory of those midnight cries from the bereaved mothers and families who lost their children prematurely to preventable illnesses; pregnant women who died before, during and after childbirth; lives, too numerous to count, that were lost as a result of poor access to basic healthcare and my own personal close encounter with death as a result of the failings of our healthcare systems challenged and fuelled my passion to find an innovative and scalable solution that could change the poor narrative of healthcare across Africa,” Adewara said.

She stated that technology presented her with a unique opportunity to mitigate the impact of brain drain by leveraging the Mobihealth’s integrated telehealth platform to reduce the negative impact of the short supply of doctors across Africa, reduce barriers that result from long distances and address the lack of health insurance for 95 percent of Africa’s population.

Adewara dedicated the award to many other amazing women who are doing great things globally to support the sustainable development goals (SDGS) despite the odds that are stacked up against female entrepreneurs, and to the girl child everywhere in Africa, who she urged to dare to dream as it was her big dreams that fired her zeal for success.

The 2020 World Bank’s Global SDGS and Her competition saw seven women entrepreneurs win the various categories of the award. The inspirational women were selected from a pool of 2,400 applicants from around the world who competed in the 2020 SDGS and Her competition.