Google and Harvard Global Health Partner to Update Worldwide COVID-19 Public Forecasts

Google partners with Harvard Global Health to update COVID-19 public forecasts.

Google launched a set of prediction models on COVID-19, known as COVID-19 Public Forecasts, in collaboration with Harvard Global Health Institute in August 2020. These models offer accurate projects about cases, deaths, ventilator availability, ICU utilization and other important metrics.

However, these models were only limited to data on the United States. Now, both organizations plan to update these forecasts and expand this to include the rest of the world.

The COVID-19 Public Forecasts will use data from Johns Hopkins University, Descartes Labs, the United States Census Bureau, and a host of other sources. The aim is to create a public resource to facilitate first-responders in healthcare and other key stake holders in the public sector.

Availability of this data will assist health workers in doing more efficient resource planning and governments in identifying best testing strategies and virus hotspots.

Dr. Thomas Tsai, Assistant Professor of Surgery at Harvard Medical School and health policy researcher in the Department of Surgery at Brigham explains that "by providing accurate, timely predictions of cases, infections, hospitalizations, and deaths to both policy makers and the general public, it will enhance our ability to understand and respond to the rapidly evolving COVID-19 pandemic."

It has been reported that Google is now introducing the COVID-19 Public Forecasts for Japan based on the publicly available data on the COVID-19 Situation in Japan.

Google hopes to make these forecast models customizable to improve their usability for other problems and datasets.