Public Health Heroes Awards Ceremony

For its achievements in using information technology to provide up-to-date health education and medical information in developing, post-conflict, and isolated regions of the world

WiRED International’s mission is to ensure equal access to information that saves lives. Providing equipment, coordination, and contacts, it brings vital information to communities coping with the challenges of war, poverty, and dislocation. Within a single day, WiRED can convert an empty room into a technology hub with global reach.

Executive director Gary Selnow, Ph.D. (a professor at San Francisco State University) began WiRED’s work in 1997 while serving as a Fulbright Fellow at Croatia’s University of Zagreb just following the Balkan War. Dr. Selnow was moved by the war’s impact on the region’s children, who were without adequate educational resources and had no access to basic computer technologies. With a small seed grant from USAID, he launched WiRED—inspired by the idea that access to the Internet could help end the children’s isolation and enhance their education. That idea evolved into a larger effort to provide medical education and information resources for healthcare educators and practitioners in troubled regions.

WiRED’s technology information centers have served some one million people annually at nearly 100 locations in 12 countries on four continents. WiRED’s Medical Information Centers supply isolated doctors and other healthcare professionals with computers, Internet access, and other technology; medical curricula; and collaboration with well-trained doctors in developed countries. WiRED’s Community Health Information Centers connect people at the grassroots level to interactive computer-based information—often the only source of health information available to them.

WiRED believes that no medication or medical device can do as much to promote good health in remote regions as can a doctor’s knowledge of good medicine. In addition to helping bridge the information gap, WiRED operates on the philosophy that its Centers should help promote reconciliation in communities through local collaboration and equal access.


2009 National Hero - WiRED International		Related Links WiRED International web site San Francisco Chronicle, "Wired International connects doctors in war zones to their colleagues outside"
For its achievements in using information technology to provide up-to-date health education and medical information in developing, post-conflict, and isolated regions of the world WiRED International’s mission is to ensure equal access to information that saves lives. Providing equipment, coordination, and contacts, it brings vital information to communities coping with the challenges of war, poverty, and dislocation. Within a single day, WiRED can convert an empty room into a technology hub with global reach. Executive director Gary Selnow, Ph.D. (a professor at San Francisco State University) began WiRED’s work in 1997 while serving as a Fulbright Fellow at Croatia’s University of Zagreb just following the Balkan War. Dr. Selnow was moved by the war’s impact on the region’s children, who were without adequate educational resources and had no access to basic computer technologies. With a small seed grant from USAID, he launched WiRED—inspired by the idea that access to the Internet could help end the children’s isolation and enhance their education. That idea evolved into a larger effort to provide medical education and information resources for healthcare educators and practitioners in troubled regions. WiRED’s technology information centers have served some one million people annually at nearly 100 locations in 12 countries on four continents. WiRED’s Medical Information Centers supply isolated doctors and other healthcare professionals with computers, Internet access, and other technology; medical curricula; and collaboration with well-trained doctors in developed countries. WiRED’s Community Health Information Centers connect people at the grassroots level to interactive computer-based information—often the only source of health information available to them. WiRED believes that no medication or medical device can do as much to promote good health in remote regions as can a doctor’s knowledge of good medicine. In addition to helping bridge the information gap, WiRED operates on the philosophy that its Centers should help promote reconciliation in communities through local collaboration and equal access.