New York Times: In Bangladesh, a Half-Century of Saving Lives With Data
Amy Yee, journalist

“…Matlab is not just the name of a region. It is synonymous with the rural research site of the [International Center for Diarrheal Disease Research, Bangladesh (icddr,b),] whose headquarters is 34 miles away in Dhaka, Bangladesh’s capital. … Ideas that germinated at Matlab have saved countless lives in Bangladesh and beyond. … Data was essential to these advances. That work in Matlab began in 1966, when researchers began tracking demographic and health data from about 28,000 people. The research center now collects data from about 220,000 people in Matlab, and has become the longest-running health surveillance system in the developing world. This trove of nearly 50 years of data has changed the way health research in developing countries can be monitored and evaluated…” (11/17).