Not only do they look good – but iPhones can save your life!

Charmian Love

January 25, 2010

It is great to see examples where technology is celebrated for providing real and direct ways of delivering social good. In this case, saving a life. According to this article on Wired’s website ‘Man Buried in Haiti Rubble Uses iPhone to Treat Wounds, Survives’ U.S. filmmaker Dan Woolley was trapped in the rubble Haiti earthquake with his mobile phone.

‘He used this device to illuminate his surroundings and snap photos of the wreckage so he could find a safe place to wait for his rescue, after which he followed instructions from an iPhone first-aid app to fashion a bandage and tourniquet for his leg and to stop the bleeding from his head wound. The app even warned Woolley not to fall asleep if he felt he was going into shock, so he set his cellphone’s alarm clock to go off every 20 minutes. Sixty-five hours later, a French rescue team saved him.’
Despite the fact that this is a small scale story, it does represent and symbol of how mobile technology has the potential to profoundly shape…and save….lives.

Thanks to Jim Vanides (@jgvanides) for the twitter link to the article.