Epidemiologists at the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) are using data from feature phones to track outbreaks and movement patterns of malaria and cholera, reports the MIT Technology Review.
Because malaria spreads from person to person via mosquito, human travel patterns can contribute to the spread of the disease. Caroline Buckee, HSPH assistant professor of epidemiology, has developed a model using data from cellphone towers that is capable of tracking movement patterns among populations in malaria-prone countries.
Calls and texts from Kenya's nearly 15 million mobile phone users, across nearly 12 000 cell towers, were mapped, providing data on users leaving their primary settlements, where they went, and how long their journeys lasted. The data allows researchers to estimate the probability that an individual is carrying a disease, to establish which areas are the most common sources of disease, and to make note of which areas diseased individuals return to most frequently.
The results show that malaria in Kenya principally originates from the Lake Victoria region and is carried to other parts of the country, especially eastwards towards Nairobi, according to an HSPH report.
"This is the first time that such a massive amount of cellphone data - from millions of individuals over the course of a year - has been used, together with detailed infectious disease data, to measure human mobility and understand how a disease is spreading," says Buckee.
Using big data will help public health officials to control imported cases of malaria, says Buckee, and also has the potential to help inform the public of the increased dangers of particular regions.
A similar method has been put to use to track cholera outbreaks in Rwanda. Nathan Eagle, HSPH adjunct assistant professor of epidemiology, used cellphone data to observe areas that suddenly experienced a slowdown in human travel. Eagle suggested a sudden reduction in movement could indicate that there was a looming epidemic in the region.
He was partially correct - the reduced travel was often caused by flooding, but because flooding is often accompanied by a cholera outbreak two weeks later, the predictive model was able to play a role in addressing epidemics.
Other pilot projects using cellphones to target maternal health, child health and malnutrition have already been launched, and there is a great deal of potential for scaled-up projects, longitudinal studies and expansion.
"The use of cellular phones for healthcare and public health is one of the most promising developments in the quest to achieve universal health coverage worldwide, because mobile phones are rapidly becoming the communication technology of choice - and increasingly so among the poor," says HSPH dean Julio Frenk.
Share