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After nearly 28 years, The Communication Initiative (The CI) Global is entering a new chapter. 

Following a period of transition, the global website has been transferred to the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) in South Africa, where it will be administered by the Social and Behaviour Change Communication Division. Wits' commitment to social change and justice makes it a trusted steward for The CI's legacy and future. 

On the transfer, co-founder Victoria Martin expressed her pleasure to see this work continue under Wits' leadership, knowing that co-founder Warren Feek (1953–2024) would have felt deep pride in The CI Global's Africa-led direction. 

As Wits, we honour the team and partners who sustained The CI for decades and look forward building from that strong base. This includes co-founders Warren Feek (1953-2024) and Victoria Martin as well as La Iniciativa de Comunicación (CILA), which continues independently at lainiciativadecomunicacion.com with links to The CI Global site. We are also eager to forge new partnerships and entertain new ideas as we consider how best to contribute to social and behaviour change in our rapidly evolving environment.

If you are joining the International Social and Behaviour Change Communication (SBCC) Summit in Panama, please join Wits and CILA on Monday, 22 June, to share your thoughts and suggestion for the relaunch of the Communication Initiative. We will be in Pacifica 5 from 12-1:25 for the Refuel, Reflect, and Renew Lunch Series: The Communication Initiative: celebrating a driving force for Communication for Social Change and the way forward. We will reflect on the legacy of Warren Feek and family in creating the Communication Initiative, consider the contributions of CI over the years and then turn our attention towards the future in this dynamic session. 

If you are unable to join us in Panama, we still want to hear from you. Please contribute your thoughts by following this link: https://redcap.link/CommunicationInitiative2026 or reaching out to ci_surveys@commint.com. 

You can also follow the QR Code:

 https://redcap.link/CommunicationInitiative2026

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HealthMap.org

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HealthMap.org is a collection of map, video, and print-based materials on infectious disease outbreaks and related topics from a team of researchers, epidemiologists, and software developers at Boston Children's Hospital, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 2006, the site utilises "online informal sources for disease outbreak monitoring and real-time surveillance of emerging public health threats" in order to create means of communicating with the public and with professionals about disease prevalence. The programme uses geographic mapping to deliver real-time information on a range of emerging infectious diseases for an audience that includes libraries, local health departments, governments, and international travelers.

"HealthMap brings together disparate data sources, including online news aggregators, eyewitness reports, expert-curated discussions and validated official reports, to achieve a ...view of the current global state of infectious diseases and their effect on human and animal health." Through an automated process, updating constantly, "the system monitors, organizes, integrates, filters, visualizes and disseminates online information about emerging diseases in nine languages, in order to facilitate early detection of global public health threats."

Projects include:

Thermia - To use this site, one enters a child's temperature and symptoms to see what might be done at home and when to call a doctor.

Flu Near You - This site aggregates and maps reports on current flu outbreaks - in part based upon citizen participation, observation, and reporting.

HealthMap Vaccine Finder - This site supports those who are wanting vaccinations with information on where to find them. (See related summaries below.)

ProMED, a partner site - "ProMED is working to enlarge networks in Francophone Africa (ProMED-FRA) posted in French, and East Africa (ProMED-EAFR) posted in English, as well as to improve the multilingual capacity of PRO/MBDS [Mekong Delta Basin Surveillance]. ProMED has partnered with HealthMap..." to offer maps to visualise disease outbreak locations.


The frequently asked questions (FAQ) page explains technical transitions from one version to another, using maps and geo-loaction settings, searching, alerts, and interface displays.

A mobile app, HealthMap's Outbreaks Near Me application, allows mobile phone users to monitor disease outbreaks.

The Disease Daily is a digital print format infectious disease news website intending to put outbreak alerts into context, showing readers the impact of infectious disease on policy, economics, and community through daily coverage, research and policy analysis, various series on health issues, and a commentary section.

HealthMap's content is aggregated from freely available information from the sources listed on the website.

Source

The HealthMap website, March 13 2014.