Today marked a day full of celebrations as two of the RLabs Social Services broke the 100,000 users barrier. The services Drug Advice Support (DAS) and Angel was started in 2008 to address the problem of drug addiction in the Western Cape. The project started with 10 learners who subscribed to the DAS service before it exploded later in 2008 (See video of first mobile chat counsellors above). Towards the end of 2008 in partnership with MXit a new service called Angel was launched to provide 24 hour access to information addressing Drug Addiction issues.
DAS is a mobile counselling service that provide users an opportunity to access services from trained counsellors via their cell phones using the JamiiX platform. Today the RLabs counselling hub manages over 200 conversations per hour and already achieved over 750,000 conversations over the last two years.
Angel is the information Service that runs 24 hours a day providing users access to relevant info in the area of drug addiction, abuse, depression and stress. Today Angel receive over 200,000 views per week via MXit indicating the relevance and need of such services. Angel is also available as a mobi site for users who do not have access to the MXit platform.
However, since 2008 these services have supported users accross South Africa and beyond. This great milestone is all due to the hard work of all at RLabs and the Community Organisation Impact Direct supported by MXit, JamiiX and ISLabs. Special thanks to all the mobile counsellors and the above organisations for plowing back into the communities of South Africa as we using technology to bring about Social Change.
Source: Technology for Community Empowerment
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