MapCrowd is a community-driven, crowdsourced platform designed to gather and publicize the most up-to-date country-level information on the hepatitis C virus (HCV). MapCrowd provides free access to national, regional, and international data on HCV and allows users to access and download the data for their own analyses and needs.
Worldwide, an estimated 71 million people are chronically infected with the hepatitis C virus (HCV). Obtaining reliable, update-to-date information on HCV is a major challenge for health experts and HCV advocates. The quantity and quality of data on HCV prevalence, access to prevention tools, availability, and pricing of diagnostics and medicines, treatment uptake, and national HCV policies varies considerably across countries. Often, this information can be difficult to obtain due to poor surveillance systems, limited diagnostic capacities, weak infrastructure, and lack of political commitment or awareness. Particularly at the national level, sources for recent, consistently updated data are often scarce. Until now, there has been no centralized system for collecting and sharing this vital information with the international health community.
To address the lack of data and enhance global hepatitis C advocacy efforts, in 2016 Médecins du Monde (MdM) and Treatment Action Group (TAG) launched mapCrowd, an online crowdsourcing platform designed to gather and publicize the most up-to-date country-level information on the hepatitis C virus (HCV). In 2021, the mapCrowd database gained additional support by the Hepatitis C Partnership for Control and Treatment, or Hepatitis C PACT– a partnership among Médecins Sans Frontières, Drugs for Neglected Diseases initiative, Treatment Action Group, and Foundation for Innovative New Diagnostics – the global alliance for diagnostics, to inform country-specific campaigns and national hepatitis planning processes in low- and middle-income countries.
