It’s World Health Day today, and we thought we’d give you a bit of an update on Ovi Life Tools.

Nokia is continuing to invest in ways of reaching the next billion with plans to beef-up its Ovi Life Tools service by launching its healthcare channel in both India and Indonesia later this half following a very promising reception of the health channels in both China and in Nigeria.

Healthcare services continue to trend positively in China with pregnancy advice having the highest activation rate in February.  Also in Nigeria where Ovi Life Tools is still in early days, the healthcare channel has proven to be very popular since it was launched in November last year.

The healthcare services offers pregnancy and childcare advice, men’s health, and women’s health in all countries. There is also a range of health topics like respiratory, heart, diabetes, hepatitis and digestive health which are specific to some countries.

To give you an idea of how it works, the Pregnancy Care channel provides daily content that parallels the weekly development stages of pregnancy (e.g. fetal development), and Infant Care, provides advice and tips to support child development in the early years of childhood.

When you think of the amount of women in rural areas of emerging markets without health facilities close-by, then simple health awareness messages and information can help make a difference.

For those of you who don’t know about life tools…

Ovi Life Tools is an SMS based, subscription information service designed for emerging markets which offers a wide range of information services covering healthcare, agriculture, education and entertainment that can help improve economic prosperity and quality of life.  The service is currently available in India, Indonesia, China and Nigeria.

An estimated 3.7 billion people in the world have mobile phones; however, 1.2 billion people have no web browser on their phones, only basic voice and SMS capabilities. For those who don’t have access to a browser on their phone, or those who cannot afford it, SMS based services provide an ideal solution. Ovi Life Tools works wherever a phone is in range of a mobile network, without any GPRS subscription. Daily information updates are sent over SMS directly to the Ovi Life Tools inbox and displayed in an easy to read format using text and graphics.