Afghanistan’s All-Girl Robotics Team Making Ventilators From Car Parts
Two-thirds of Afghan teenage girls do not attend school.
They’re known as the Afghan Dreamers, an all-girls robotics team is trying to build ventilators for coronavirus patients using parts from old Toyota Corollas and a design from MIT.
The girls, aged 15 to 17, are part of a team funded by Afghan tech entrepreneur and founder of not-for-profit Digital Citizen Fund, Roya Mahboob, and have competed in technology challenges around the world.
From a country where there are major barriers to gender equality and two-thirds of teenage girls do not attend school, it is an extraordinary feat.
Amid the global health crisis, they are now turning their expertise to developing low-cost, hand-operated ventilators in a country which faces low COVID-19 testing capabilities and a huge shortage in assisted breathing machines; it’s estimated for the country’s population of about 35 million, only 200 ventilators are currently in working order.
While there are hand-operated ventilators frequently used in ambulances and emergency care, their shortfall is that, as the name would suggest, require a healthcare worker to manually squeeze the bag to fill the patient’s lungs with air.
So, on the 26th of March, the then-governor of Herat, Abdul Qayoum Rahimi, issued a challenge to doctors, recent university graduates, and the Afghan Dreamers to develop a low-cost, simplified and easily replicated mechanised version.
The design, released by MIT, is deliberately low-tech so that it can be assembled with an array of parts from around the world.
While it cannot replace approved intensive care unit ventilators, the university notes, “in terms of functionality, flexibility, and clinical efficacy, the MIT E-Vent is anticipated to have utility in helping free up existing supply or in life-or-death situations when there is no other option.”
This piece was published on whimn.com.au on May 31, 2020