With dengue endemic in more than 128 countries, and 390 million infections each year, the World Mosquito Program (WMP) has a very important mission: to protect the global community from mosquito-borne diseases.

A not-for-profit initiative, the WMP has established a self-sustaining method of dengue, Zika and chikungunya control, by introducing naturally occurring bacteria, Wolbachia, into the local mosquito population. Once released, these Wolbachia carrying mosquitoes breed with local mosquitoes. Over time, Wolbachia establishes in the mosquito population and reduces its ability to transmit these viruses to people.

Data is captured at every stage of the process, and weekly reports are generated to track the establishment of Wolbachia and inform decisions about release strategies.

In order to increase the reach and impact of their program, the WMP needed to scale from pilot release sites to become an international not-for-profit initiative, operating across multiple countries. To achieve this level of scale, they worked with ThoughtWorks to build the core digital platform needed to underpin their expansion strategy.

Together we built a suite of digital tools to increase the efficiency of operations in the field and the laboratory and to enable us to capture and use the program’s data in more meaningful ways.

We developed the ‘Core Data’ mobile and desktop application for field workers, to replace their manual, paper-based process. The app was designed to support field activities, such as releasing, collecting and monitoring mosquitoes, and also to capture, enhance and display data for decision-making. It was important that the application be available offline, making it suitable for use in remote communities.

The app is currently being used in 10 field sites, across nine different countries: Australia, Brazil, Colombia, Indonesia, Vietnam, Vanuatu, Fiji, Kiribati, and Mexico. Releases in New Caledonia, India, and Sri Lanka are currently in the pipeline.