Google Hits To Warn Of Flu Epidemics

From The Guardian:

Search engine to use online queries to predict health trends before official health bodies

Google already has a window into our souls through our internet searches and it now has insight into our ailing bodies too.

The internet giant is using its vast database of individual search terms to predict the emergence of flu up to two weeks before government epidemiologists.

Google Flu Trends uses the tendency of people to seek online help for their health problems.

By tracking searches for terms such as 'cough', 'fever' and 'aches and pains' it claims to be able to accurately estimate where flu is circulating.

Google tested the idea in nine regions of the US and found it could accurately predict flu outbreaks between seven and 14 days earlier than the federal centres for disease control and prevention.

Google hopes the idea could also be used to help track other diseases. Flu Trends is limited to the US.

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