Sentinel E-Pandemic Tracker

Inspiration

This inspiration for this project has been drawn on the tireless efforts of health professionals to diligently follow-up and trace individuals that may have been exposed to symptomatic members of the public that have tested positive for COVID-19.

What it does

The Sentinel Pandemic Tracker trawls through the location data of social media posts and check-ins made by an individual that has tested positive for the COVID-19 virus.

Using similar techniques employed by social media platforms such as Facebook for providing a list of suggested friends based on close proximity of platform users, the location data used from a patient's posts can be used to trace all users that happened to be within the same locations visited by the individual as far back as 2 weeks (the current agreed incubation period of the virus). No personal data would need to be collected which should allow the application to remain in line with laws on personal data protection and doctor-patient confidentiality.

The results it is trying to achieve:

• Provide a reliable and systematic method for reaching out to potentially affected individuals that may have come into close contact with a patient that has tested positive for the COVID-19 virus. This allows for notifying individuals that they have an elevated risk of having contracted the disease and be able to provide a quick survey allowing the user to confirm and report any symptoms as well as whether or not it is recommend that they follow-up with official testing.

• Provide real-time data on areas of high-risk for contracting the disease based on survey data for symptoms and known positive tests. This realtime data when provided to users can be used as a form of social engineering to encourage healthy behaviors such as hand-washing, social distancing and taking self-quarantine more seriously. Knowing that there are individuals that are symptomatic and/or have tested positive for the virus within your immediate community should hit close enough to home to result in reinforced health-conscious behaviors.

What's next for Sentinel E-Pandemic Tracker

To develop a prototype application on either Facebook or Twitter's application development platforms, and seek partnership with these and other social media platforms to access media posts and anonymous location metadata. To partner with the same said social media platforms, local health authorities and the World Health Organization to draw-up a relevant survey for evaluating symptoms and putting forward recommendations for formal testing of COVID-19. To work with social media platforms to provide a risk notification and symptom survey where applicable to potentially affected users on their platforms. This would be provided based on risk data (and detected possible exposures) within the local area of the individual while they actively browse the platform.