mHealth in Latin America: The Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) launched a program to generate mobile phone-based services for the lower income populations in Latin America and the Caribbean. The services will address poverty problems, including health, education, social protection, employment and business, according to the IDB. Around 80 percent of the region’s population, or 460 million people, has a mobile phone, while almost 50 percent of them have incomes of less than $300 a month. IDB is working with industry partners, including Telefonica, Microsoft, Qualcomm, Open Mobile Consortium, MobileActive.org, mHealth Alliance, the Carso Health Institute and the Federal University of Amazonas. More

Betting on health reform: Venture capitalists focused on healthcare are trying to guess which way federal health reform will fall as they decide which start-ups are likely to benefit most, according to a report from peHUB: "Healthcare VCs — including Psilos and Chrysalis — are funding companies that help people stay healthier and manage chronic diseases, figuring this is one way the government will ultimately move to take costs out of healthcare." More

mHealth similar to other mobile verticals from development standpoint? DeviceAnywhere CEO Faraz Syed posted his takeaways from the CTIA event earlier this month over at the company blog. Syed noted that the show had a clear spotlight on wireless health, and he also concluded that -- from a development and quality of service standpoint -- wireless health isn't too different from banking or other verticals: "When it comes down to it, mHealth’s mobile app needs aren’t terribly dissimilar to those of mBanking, or any other industry for that matter. They want guaranteed reliability, security, speed of deployment, and reduced development costs (as compared to in-house)…and basically fewer headaches. Pretty much what all developers and enterprises want from their mobile apps, right?" (Also, special thanks to Faraz for the plug and kind words about MobiHealthnews.) More