Firstly, and most importantly, I sincerely hope you and family are keeping well. Secondly, I want to apologise to all my readers for slightly deviating from original plan – I had stated at the end of my previous article that the next one would be about ‘Cloud Native Cloud Platform Infrastructure and Healthcare Cloud’. Instead, I have decided to share my views on the role of Data in situation like, the planet is currently facing – the Covid 19 Pandemic.

A pandemic is a special case of a disaster, but more widespread than other types. Disaster management plans typically consist of four stages: response, recovery, mitigation, and preparedness. With COVID-19, we are currently focused on the response stage and the response strategy centers on containment and suppression via social distancing. All four stages require decision-makers at all levels to gather and process enormous amounts of data and this is where machine learning (ML) and artificial intelligence (AI) technologies can help.

Over the last couple of weeks, I have been involved in IT projects which are directly and closely associated with the pandemic such as temporary (Nightingale) hospitals in UK and few others. I feel there are so much more that the data is capable of to help combat these pandemics. Data is necessary for our understanding of the world, and particularly for unique, unprecedented circumstances such as these. I strongly feel that we, in the IT industry, should stand alongside our NHS heroes and support them in the best possible way, as we are capable to do so.

While technologies, such as artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML), have been monumental to the insights, obtaining reliable data at scale continues to be a priority. Without a single place (or few multiple data hubs with links between them) to gather and analyse this data, decision-makers are unable to move as quickly as the response demands; information in spreadsheets held by disparate organisations will be duplicated and rapidly becomes outdated, leading to inaccurate or incomplete understanding of the situation.

Let’s take a look into what we get out of this data. Without diving too deep, AI which has immense reliance on data could be used in three different ways in the current crisis;

1. Rapidly develop antibodies and vaccines for the Covid-19 virus
2. Scan through existing drugs to see if any could be repurposed
3. Design a drug to fight both the current and future coronavirus outbreaks

Other example of how the UK government intends to use the data is to consolidate information from across the NHS (hospitals) and partner organisations, to give decision-makers more accurate visibility into the status of the response. This includes metrics such as:

1. Current occupancy levels at hospitals, broken down by general beds and specialist and/or critical care beds
2. Current capacity of A&E departments and current waiting times
3. Statistics about the lengths of stay for Covid-19 patients

We are still struggling to find the best way to combat the virus, but on the bright side, there have been new innovations that collect data to protect citizens from the pandemic.  New solutions powered by data, including electronic surveillance solutions and machine learning models, are now in place to prevent the spread of the disease. To summarize, following are the few applications, where I see data driven approaches making a huge difference:-

AI/ML to identify, track and forecast outbreaks, AI/ML to help diagnose the virus, drones delivering medical supplies, robot sterilisers, delivering food and supplies and performing other tasks, increasing drug development cycle, Chatbots to share information, Supercomputers working on a coronavirus vaccine, among many others.

In the middle of the mayhem that we are in, I believe a secure data storage system should be prioritised to ensure that vulnerable people suffering from the pandemic do not fall victim to cyber-enabled or cyber-dependent crimes. I am sure everybody is taking necessary measures to minimise the risks.

Finally, technology is an important enabler in fighting disease, and the collection and analysis of data is a crucial part of that fight. This crisis has reinforced the value of quick, secure collaboration. It has already triggered a chain of innovation, powered by huge volumes of data. All this data needs to be rolled up, ingested, analysed, and shared in a timely way so we can take action to help prevent the spread of the disease. By using data to track the disease and model its behaviour, we can hopefully make the coronavirus pandemic a thing of the past.

Stay safe, stay strong and listen to your regional/country’s guidance. We will beat this!!