Hedera is working with the Deepak Chopra Foundation on an open access trust platform for mental health resources, “Dallas Innovates

Hedera Hashgraph, the The Dallas-based distributed ledger platform has announced a new, unlikely partnership with the Chopra Foundation to combat rising suicide rates and promote mental health awareness.

Together with the foundation, which is dedicated to supporting integrative health and the well-being of body and mind, Hedera will develop a freely accessible online platform for the Never Alone initiative. The platform will provide a verified set of resources to a global community to enable safe access to science-based research, work by mental health and wellness experts, and pragmatic tools for everyday use.

It is an opportunity to use technology forever while navigating the mental crisis that continues to grow in parallel with the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Indeed, we are seeing a second mental health pandemic of rising stress levels and rising suicide rates,” said Poonacha Machaiah, CEO of the Chopra Foundation, in a statement. “The community will be both global and local, offering people in different countries and cultures the opportunity to provide vital resources on a trusted platform to support those affected.”

Although Deepak Chopra, the founder and chairman of the Chopra Foundation, is better known for practices such as a 21-day meditation with Oprah Winfrey, he told Forbes that he had studied “blockchain” for a while.

Chopra’s goal is to use technology to achieve mental and emotional well-being and suicide prevention. He said he knew a platform with traceability, collaboration and proof of work was needed – and as a “great student of origins” he saw distributed systems as “basic mental health systems and more”.

According to Chopra, the partnership with Hedera enables him and the foundation to realize a long-term vision.

He and his team have set themselves the goal of creating a trustworthy network that offers a “digital fingerprint to democratize access to resources for mental and emotional health”. He called Hedera’s platform very robust and secure.

“With suicide rates and mental health problems rising rapidly, especially amid the global pandemic, people need access to authentic and trustworthy information,” he said in a statement. “We knew Hedera Hashgraph’s distributed ledger technology provided the opportunity.”

Distributed ledger technology takes over mental health

Hedera hash graph is not accurate blockchain;; it is According to co-founders Mance Harmon and Leemon Baird, a proprietary distributed ledger technology could revolutionize smart contracts, cryptocurrency, and file storage, and even help protect the privacy of social media users. The The alternative distributed ledger, launched in August 2017, was launched with the aim of addressing many of the issues plaguing more popular blockchain platforms.

Last September, Hedera opened its main network to the public, giving anyone the opportunity to create accounts or create decentralized applications (dapps) on their network.

The company touts its platform, which offers faster transactions and greater scalability, and improves it for businesses and commerce. Hundreds of developers built on Hedera’s network in the closed beta. At the time of launch, 26 dapps and solutions were running live in the main network’s open access beta.

The Chopra Foundation’s Never Alone Initiative is being developed in the Hedera network.

This includes building a global content platform based on the Hedera Consensus Service in collaboration with CG CreativeStudios, which will be responsible for the brand and UX design.

The platform, which is available worldwide, enables everyone from medical professionals to meditation experts to upload content to a service register. It’s registered with the Hedera Consensus Service and digitally fingerprinted, which essentially provides a guarantee of where its content is, making it “completely tamper-proof”.

Users can then log into the platform and view the trusted content with the knowledge that it has not been changed or tampered with.

This is one of the main elements that Chopra addressed: “We quickly realized that only Hedera Hashgraph’s consensus service offers the ability to ensure the authenticity of content through a verifiable, time-stamped event log,” he said. Equally important to Chopra is Hedera’s distributed governance, according to Forbes.

In February 2019, the company founded the Hedera Governing Council to regulate changes to its software, ensure stability and ensure continued decentralization.

The founding members of the council were Deutsche Telekom, DLA Piper, the magazine Luiza, Nomura Holdings, Inc. and Swisscom Blockchain AG. Hedera later added tech giants like IBM, Tata Communications, and Google.

The platform stewards all have an equal say in updating Hedera’s platform code base or setting guidelines. According to Hedera, users are protected by a governance model, the integrity of the code base is guaranteed, and the source code can be verified.

Within the Never Alone Initiative

According to the foundation, the goal of Never Alone is “to address the roots of human stress and suffering, drive innovation based on scientific research, and democratize access to wellness resources and everyday tools for those in need”. It is fully funded by donations, each of which is verified and traceable via intelligent contracts in the Hedera network.

This gives donors transparency and confidence, just as users know that the content they are consuming is authentic.

“The Hedera Consensus Service has extensive content authentication capabilities,” said Harmon, who is also CEO of Hedera, in a statement. “The combination of high throughput and low cost uniquely enables the creation of a reviewable, time-stamped event log that shows every step and activity in the life of a piece of content from creation to the end user.”

The development of the Hedera network includes the creation of a digital token – the Never Alone token – as an incentive for content creators and healthcare workers to participate.

There are also plans to add a real-time resource finder that will allow users to connect with volunteers, counselors, mental health experts, organizations and hospitals in their area.

“We are proud that this technology is being used to provide trusted expert resources to those most in need among the rising suicide rates in the US and internationally,” said Harmon. “Working with the Chopra Foundation on the Never Alone initiative provides us with the perfect opportunity to bring this emerging technology to the forefront in solving pressing societal and health problems.”

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