The Great Influenza Experiment
I’m excited to see a new project in the making, The Great Influenza Experiment. This is the first project I’ve seen in health and medicine that’s organized around traditional citizen science concepts, and I definitely expect to see more.
From their About page:
The Great Influenza Experiment is a proof of concept project that we believe will demonstrate that networks of individuals can accurately predict influenza activity. We are inspired by two similar and powerful concepts – Web 2.0 and Citizen Science. Web 2.0 applications such as Wikipedia and Craigslist allow individuals new, powerful ways to communicate and share massive amounts of information across the internet. Citizen Science projects such as the Audubon Society’s Christmas Bird Count or the Canadian NatureWatch programs recruit community volunteers to assist in large scientific surveillance endeavors. Both concepts employ the power of the masses for the public welfare. With the help of community volunteers we hope to provide a needed, community based influenza surveillance system.
It’s exciting to see this effort, and I’m especially intrigued by the use of Facebook. We’ll keep an eye on this for sure!
