When you think about Facebook, Twitter, and other social networks, questions of health care, rural African villages, and humanitarian aid are not the first things that pop up in your mind.  Although, social networking sites are oftentimes used for social purposes, they have one prevailing positive attribute: the ability to “spread the word” to hundreds of millions of people around the globe. Whether it be Facebook groups asking users to “like” actress, Megan Fox, or sites like YouTube that turn a 14-year old kid with a web cam into Justin Beiber, social networking sites certainly get the message across.

And its relevance to provision of basic health care to people in African countries? Assuming that the average American has no idea about the current state of health care systems in rural African villages, a simple Tweet, Facebook post, or blog can spread the experiences and needs of rural health systems to a person with a computer or smart phone in New York, London, Beijing, Cape Town, and even small town America. Social media (through the internet) is a relatively new phenomenon with capabilities beyond that which any kind of campaign or social movement has ever experienced.

As the m-Health conference concluded, one of the biggest headlines was the expectation of 500 million mobile health devices being used on the African continent in the next 5 years. If 500 million is the number of mobile health devices (typically cell phones) used on the African continent, internet and cell phone use among people in African countries must be enormously higher. Thus, the potential for a strong, direct connection between people living and working in African countries with people living and working in Iowa, Florida, and Michigan is incredible.

According to a study done by the Society for New Communications Research, the nonprofit world uses social media more than any other social institution. The opportunity for global connection and cooperation are endless when social media is employed to its fullest.  Despite trivial, superficial and admittedly negative effects of the ever growing social media movement, do you think social media should be considered as a useful force in providing health access, care and development to African countries? What are some of the downsides of this new social media revolution?

On Thursday October 23rd Michigan State University’s chapter of SCOUT BANANA hosted our main event of the semester, Capture the Banana. The event was a take on a traditional game of capture the flag with real bananas used as “flags”. We played in the area surrounding Beaumont Tower on campus with sidewalks and roads as boundaries. Yearbook staff was there to take pictures as the yellow and red teams, distinguished by colored arm bands, hid their bananas and began to play. Our first game began at 7 and lasted about an hour, with the second game lasting 30 minutes.

One especially entertaining part of our version of capture the flag was the live banana (a chapter member in a banana suit) running around the area every few minutes. If you tagged the banana all your prisoners were set free. At the end of the event every player received prizes donated from local businesses including free burrito or coffee coupons and t-shirts from the bookstore, making the event charge of 3 dollars per player definitely worth it.

After purchasing fabric for armbands, bananas, and raffle tickets, it only cost about 12 dollars for our club to host this event. We began advertising two weeks in advance with flyers on and around campus and a Facebook event. We expected about 100 people to come play but our actual count was 30. Unfortunately we were competing with an Invisible Children event on campus the same night!

Capture the Banana was a very easy event to put together with a lot of appeal for college students looking for a fun and slightly ridiculous way to spend their evening. Participants also had the opportunity to add their names to our listserve to get more information about our chapter meetings and activities. Finally, we are happy to report that only one banana was squished in the planning and playing of this game.