Introduction
According to Anandarajan and Simmers (2002), many homes today are increasingly being connected to the internet following advancements in technology. The paper provides interesting perspectives on how a number of aspects regarding the internet have progressed, and as well as the progress as far as access and use of health information is concerned (Anandarajan & Simmers, 2002).
Internet Users
It has been approximately three decades since the United States’ government introduced a network that was primarily designed for research and academic. During the time, it was connected to a few hosts, who mainly constituted corporate and academic laboratories. Twelve years later, internet users had grown to fifty million, and by 2009, the figure had hit a one-billion mark. In the year 2013, the number of global internet users had increased to 2.1 billion, constituting forty percent of the total world population.
By 2012, the number of websites had increased to six hundred and thirty-four from a hundred and thirty in 1993. With time, the number of search engines also grew, and today, Google reports a record three billion queries every single day compared to nine thousand eight-hundred queries in 1993 (Tittel & Robbins, 1995).
Mobile
The year 1973 saw the invention of the first mobile phone, and thirty years later the 3G mobile network came into effect. By the year 2007, there were approximately three-hundred million subscribers to the mobile network globally. The 4G mobile network, an advanced version, was launched in 2009, and its rate of usage was simultaneous to that of Smartphone. According to studies, at least 1.4 hours are dedicated to internet activity every single day by cell phone users.
The introduction of the Smartphone came with a number of mobile applications, which are not only addictive and fun but also informative (Domingue, 2011). There has been a transformation regarding the manner in which people all over the world uses the internet since its invention (Lipscomb, 1996).
Today, the internet occupies a critical part in our everyday life, and it is certainly indispensable. The nature of internet usage is changing rapidly, especially in the telecommunication sector. In the past, applications were underdeveloped and asynchronous with sequential interactions. However, the past decade has seen a plethora of highly efficient applications, such as instant chats and video messaging (Bertot & McClure, 1999).
The figure below shows the number of internet users with the percentage of the world’s population that each represents. These figures will be used in calculating the average rate of growth that will ultimately to project the number of internet users by the end of December 2014.
World’s Internet Usage
The figure below demonstrates the distribution of internet users by continent. Asia is the leading continent, with 44.8 percent of global internet users, and this can be attributed to the densely populated communities (Donaldson, 1994). Europe follows with 21.5%, North American and South America coming third and fourth respectively. Noticeably, African internet users make up seven percent of the global usage, which can closely be linked to its expansiveness and the huge population. The Middle East and Australia close the list in that manner because of the same reasons as aforementioned (Buss & Water, 2009).
Projection of Internet Users
To forecast the number of an internet user by the end of 2018, data concerning internet users over the past five years were collected, The rate of growth for each subsequent year was calculated, and their average was computed.
The resulting estimate was the average rate of growth of internet users for the five-year period, and it is this figure that was used to project the 2014 estimate. From the computations, the average rate of growth of internet users was 11.9024 percent, and the 2014 projection was 3,076,196,976 internet users. Further, computations were undertaken, and with the current trend, it was clear that by 2018 there will be approximately fifteen billion internet user globally (Carlson, Eisenstat & Ziporyn, 2004).
According to studies, seventy-three percent of the United State’s population aged eighteen years and above use the internet to access health and nutrition information. Many consider that the internet hugely affects decisions that they make regarding their preferred health service or product (Cohen, 2007). The figure below shows the result of a study demonstrating the influence of the internet to the choice of health care and product (Kim, 2002).
Studies on web traffic have been conducted in the past, and a list of the most accessed websites for health and nutrition information was compiled. Some of the websites that topped the list include the following:
- Medicinenet.com.
- Natural health and nutritional information newsletters and health articles.
- Mayoclinic.com.
- Medline Plus.
- Drugs.com.
- Medscape.
- AiDs Patents Database.
- PubMed.
- The United States Institute of Health.
- WebMD.
In addition, Google report on 2013 search queries shows the factsheets were the most visited.
- Cystitis.
- Deep Vein Thrombosis.
- Haemorrhoids.
- Hypertension.
- Irritable Bowel Syndrome.
- Miscarriage.
- Overactive Thyroid.
- Peptic Ulcer.
- Skin Cancer.
- Underactive Thyroid.
Conclusion
The study illustrates a gradual increase the general access and usage in health information globally. However, wide internet penetration in some countries does not necessarily translate to increased access and usage of health information (Edmunds & Coye, 1998).
References
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