Google announced a tool to monitor an outbreak of dengue

Google announced a tool to monitor an outbreak of dengue Click on my ads ok


Google announced on Tuesday that aims to develop an alert system for dengue outbreaks in the world that takes into account queries about the disease site.

The company created the Dengue Trends, an experimental tool that compares searches related to dengue in Bolivia, Brazil, India, Indonesia and Singapore to official records in these countries.

According to Google, the tool performs an analysis of search patterns among users to determine if the periods when there is more research on dengue coincide with the increase in the number of occurrences of the disease.

"Using data produced by the UN and the Ministries of Health of the countries, we build a model that provides near real-time estimates of the incidence of dengue, based on popularity of search terms," ​​said software engineer Vikram Sahai's blog Google.

The advantage, according to Sahai, is that the model can facilitate a faster reaction of the government to protect the population, since the official figures take weeks to analyze.

The project is developed jointly with the Children's Hospital Boston and Harvard Medical School, USA.

The methodology used in data analysis was explained in an article written for publication "Neglected Tropical Diseases, the American scientific organization Public Library of Science.

SEARCH STANDARDS

Dengue The tool is part of Google Trends correlate, a service launched last week that relates to search the site analysis with data collected in conventional surveys by governments and organizations.

The correlate was created after the success of Flu Trends tool, which monitored the queries about the flu around the world in 2009.

Health authorities used the information to distribute vaccines and treatments for the population.

At the time, Google has published a research report in the journal Nature and was approached by researchers who wanted to use the service to monitor other issues.

Google correlate also allows specialists to put their own data for comparison with the search site.

The program noted when data for research and searches online have the same pattern as influenza outbreaks occurring at the same time it increases the number of searches for terms like "treatment for influenza."

The same type of pattern analysis is used now in Dengue Google Trends.

The disease prevention expert Peter Sever from Imperial College London University UK, said the tool can be useful to researchers, despite its limited scope.

"It will naturally be very selective, because doing research among people who use Google, but every year, these people are a larger proportion of the population," he said.