NASA Satellites to Predict Disease Outbreaks

coondoggie writes "NASA and its Applied Sciences Program will be using 14 satellites to watch the Earth's environment and help predict and prevent infectious disease outbreaks around the world. Through orbiting satellites, data is collected daily to monitor environmental changes. That information is then passed on to agencies such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Department of Defense who then apply the data to predict and track disease outbreaks and assist in making public health policy decisions. The use of remote sensing technology helps scientists predict the outbreak of some of the most common and deadly infectious diseases such as Ebola, West Nile virus and Rift Valley Fever."

Comments

something similar has done before

[holywarrior21c]

Live tropical sea surface temperature on the web http://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/vis/a000000/a003300/a003376/
El nino linked to deadly disease http://www.spacedaily.com/news/pacific-02a.html

Re:Ebola, West Nile, Rift Valley

[verySmartApe]

It's true, most of the viral hemorrhagic fevers come from Africa. But there is Machupo.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machupo_virus You didn't even mention Lassa or Marburg virus. But these scary viruses actually aren't that dangerous to most people. They are too good at killing, so they don't spread. I'm more worried about a flu pandemic.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_flu
And where did that originate? Probably SE Asia, but it's impossible to say. Probably not Africa, though.