The Center for Infectious Disease Research in Zambia (CIDRZ) is a nonprofit organization established in 1999 with the support from the University of Alabama at Birmingham, USA. Initially conceived as an infectious disease and maternal-child health research unit, CIDRZ has since expanded its operations to include support to the Zambian government in its fight against AIDS.
CIDRZ operates a wireless Wide area Network connecting its four facilities, LAB and 24 geographically dispersed health clinics with the main hospital in Lusaka. The basic layout of the network is 45Mbps point to point links interconnecting high sites that form the backbone, and 36Mbps point to multipoint links to participating health centers and clinics. The Proxim Tsunami WAN equipment operates in 5.8 GHz band for the network backbone and last mile connection to the centers. All participating centers are equipped with a Tsunami subscriber unit capable of providing a maximum throughput of 36Mbps and terminating internally on a 100MBps switch
All the clinic's networks and most of the equipment installed at the hospital are wireless. 802.11b was chosen as a standard, due to its market penetration and interoperability, (with clear upgrade path to 802.11g in future). The main requirement of computers and laptops in the clinics is mobility hence implementing the wireless Local Area Network (LAN) using CISCO Aironet 1240 with external Omni directional antennae covering an estimated 200 to 300 meter radius foot print.
