Slashdot Mirror
Preventing Epidemics with STEM
Anonymous Coward writes "IBM has released a Linux based technology enabling spatiotemporal modeling of infectious agents across the United States, providing scientists and public health officials with a powerful tool for understanding, and potentially preventing, the spread of infectious diseases. The new STEM technology provides Geographic Information System (GIS) data for every county in the United States supplied by TIGER files."
This type of tracking system is sorely needed in order to prevent little outbreaks from turning into pandemics. Knowing where the hotspots are and using that information to take measures to prevent the spread of a pathogen is of increasing importance as we become more and more mobile as a species.
However there isn't a way to track some problematic pathogens. For many diseases, there is a political aspect that prevents authorities from excercising their ability to contain the germ. HIV is the most obvious example of a virus that is so inherently related to a specific set of behaviors that it ought to be a simple matter of monitoring infected persons and preventing the disease from spreading. Unfortunately, the bearers of the virus claim that their right to these behaviors trumps the public health and safety risk posed by the virus.
If there were an outbreak of Capt. Tripps, would the government have the political will to actually put all those infected under quarantine, dooming them and essentially stripping them of all human rights, in order to prevent the spread of the disease? They have shown in the past that they are not willing to contain infected groups. What is to say that they will be in the future?
For those that don't know, Tiger is a geographic information systems package that allows the management of geograpical information that can be based on a variety of different statistical data. I haven't done too much with it, but when I was in early HS, my uncle (Who is an imaging science person, and did mapping related stuff at the time for surrounding counties) had me work for him one summer updating address ranges and directions that would be used by various county functions including emergency dispatch services. I remember I used Tiger GIS software. Interesting how much of that stuff works for geographical information management.
In undeveloped countries, the consumer controls the market. In capitalist America, the market controls you.
Intriguingly, Muslim nations and peoples have always had a strong interest in the sciences, from astrology to zoology, as their religion forbade them from other professions, such as bankers (who charge interest) and religious artisans.
While there is undoubtedly a conservative social agenda in many Muslim nations, their affinity for the natural sciences would hopefully make it easier for moderate and liberal Muslims, and Muslims as a people, to take on AIDS as a problem, from the perspective of science.
North Korea aside, China isn't as closed or sensitive to medical information as it once was. The recent inquiries into the handling of SARS shows that it is at least willing to tackle its problems.