CHALLENGES AND OPPORTUNITIES IN THE ICT SECTOR DURING AND POST-COVID-19 PANDEMIC

Abstract

This paper highlights the issues of seeking appropriate solutions, especially last year during the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown and other restrictions, and pressure made on the ICT (information and communication technology) sector to accelerate the development of ICT solutions as never before. The biggest pressure was in the health and medicine sector, as well as in education and businesses. The wider ICT community was encountered with intense demands for rapid innovative solutions due to the existing pressure to solve urgent issues associated with pandemic spreading. We review the use of advanced ICT in telemedicine, telework, healthcare mobile applications and online learning that help stop spreading the contagious pandemic disease. We also describe the use and essential role of bioinformatics, immunoinformatics and computational biology to develop COVID-19 vaccines and apply appropriate medical treatments to patients.