Over the past 20 years, Internet technology has significantly changed the landscape of public health surveillance and epidemic intelligence gathering. Disease and outbreak data is disseminated not only through formal online announcements by government agencies, but also through informal channels such as social networking sites, blogs, chat rooms, Web searches, local news media and crowdsourcing platforms.
Collectively, these online sources create an image of global public health that is fundamentally different from the one produced by traditional public health surveillance infrastructure. As these sources become more widely used and relied upon, it is imperative that health professionals collaborate to demonstrate and improve the effectiveness of these sources. We must identify strengths and weaknesses that can be capitalized upon and remedied.
Following up on the previous editions (http://healthmap.org/ddd/), the intention of the Third International Digital Disease Detection Conference is to connect innovators in health and technology to 1) continue to define this emerging field; 2) explore novel data streams and new technologies; 3) host workshops to identify and discuss strengths and weaknesses in surveillance methods, and to promote critique and development of already existing surveillance and diagnostic tools.
Organizers
- John Brownstein, Harvard Medical School and Children’s Hospital Informatics Program
- Ciro Cattuto, ISI Foundation
- Jennifer Olsen, Skoll Global Threats Fund
- Daniela Paolotti, ISI Foundation
- Mark Smolinski, Skoll Global Threats Fund
- Alessandro Vespignani, Northeastern University