As businesses re-open their doors across Ghana, they have help from a contact tracing app based on New Zealand’s successful COVID Tracer.

Widely credited for helping New Zealand reach zero active cases, the NZ COVID Tracer gave each shop a unique QR code to display at the entrance. Shoppers could scan and walk in, instead of standing in line to write their details in a notebook by hand. If a case of the virus was identified, the app let health authorities quickly trace all visitors to a location.

Re-opening the country on June 8th , New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern had said "While we're in a safer, stronger position, there's still no easy path back to pre-Covid life, but the determination and focus we have had on our health response will now be vested in our economic rebuild."

Last month, an Auckland company decided to give worldwide access to a contact tracing app based on the NZ COVID tracer. “Visitors check in themselves, and the owner can get an alert on their phone for every walk-in if they choose to.” said the Auckland-based developers of Kontakkt.Space. “Users’ data stays on their phone and auto-deletes itself. If there is a case f COVID19, every previous visitor of that location is alerted to isolate themselves in time .”

Business owners in Ghana greeted the launch positively. “I don’t have the budget for any fancy contact-tracing software” says a boutique owner on main street. “Most of my customers don't want to sign a visitor register, or display their contact details.”

“I like that my personal data stays on my phone” said a housewife walking her 8-year old son to the hairdresser. “There’s no reason to submit personal details to the shops I visit, and my phone will only buzz if a case of COVID-19 is detected. That makes me feel safe.”

“New Zealanders we feel lucky to have been able to get things under control this quickly, and we want to share our tools with Ghana. Hopefully, all parts of the world will be back to normal as soon as can be” say the creators, signing off.

Kontakkt space is available on Google Play and Apple AppStore. It can be downloaded from http://kontakkt.space