Big Data against Covid-19
Audio 02:06
An interactive world map on an LCD screen.
(Photo illustration) Getty Images - da-kuk
By: Dominique Desaunay Follow
5 mins
With the computer analysis of a colossal amount of medical data on Covid-19, the public assistance establishments of Paris hospitals have a new arsenal of fight against the epidemic.
The objective is to model the dynamics of contamination by anticipating the “hot spots” of the virus before it spreads in the population.
Publicity
For a long time,
computer programs qualified as intelligent have been
perfectly able to distinguish relevant information in
an ocean of medical data.
Computing power that is currently at the service of researchers to fight Covid-19 with
the networking of connected graphics cards,
specifies Nadim Daher, head of health data analysis systems at
NVIDIA,
this High-tech giant produces graphics processors originally designed for Gamers: "
It is precisely this ability to integrate graphics cards by interconnecting them in an optimal way, by creating servers which themselves are interconnected to other computer servers that has made it possible, for example, with extensive data analyzes in the different regions of the world to follow the mutations of the coronavirus.
But also to conduct large-scale research, scientific calculations, simulations based on artificial intelligence to achieve a result much more quickly in understanding the virus and to virtually test possible therapies capable of countering it.
"
Big Data against Covid-19 is not limited to
the sole field of medical research.
The 39 establishments dependent on the Public Assistance of Paris hospitals are studying the dynamics of the epidemic
by analyzing data from infected patients.
The aim is to detect the appearance of virus “hot spots” before they spread, explains Hector Countouris, head of the biomedical informatics team at AP-HP: “
From At the start of the epidemic, we set up a data task force to create digital decision-making tools and make them available to all health stakeholders.
At the AP-HP level and globally, the volume of this medical data is considerable, coming from 39 hospitals, each producing several million data to be analyzed as quickly as possible.
We were able to combine this information, which made it possible, for example, to visualize precisely the geographical areas that had an increased incidence of positive Covid-19 cases in order to carry out urgent actions to limit contagion.
"
This digital power at the service of our health, which has made it possible
to accelerate research in fundamental biology,
undoubtedly outlines what
the medical world of tomorrow will be like!
Heal better, faster and protect yourself almost in real time from the harmful social and economic effects of a health crisis!
You have questions or suggestions, you can write to us at
news.technologies@rfi.fr
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