Google has launched a new website that uses anonymous location data collected from users of Google’s products and services to show where people are adhering to social distancing rules and where they are not.
The ‘COVID-19 Community Mobility Reports’ web site will display community data inclinations of six categories: retail and pharmacy, recreation parks, public transport stations, workplaces, and residential.
The data will accurately track changes in social distancing over several weeks to build a detailed picture concerning areas where social distancing rules are being adhered to.
Various governments around the world have introduced social distancing in order to save lives.
The data displayed by Google will be as recent as 48 hours old and will initially cover 131 countries.
Google has said that the data will be collected ‘in aggregate’ rather than being collected at an individual level and the data will not show the actual numbers of people who are ignoring the social distancing measures which have been introduced to lower the death toll from COVID-19.
Instead, the project aims to outline percentages which could help to indicate potential surges in attendance at various locations and venues.
For public health officials and emergency services planners, the data could be vital in alerting them to the next potential hotspot when it comes to outbreaks of the deadly COVID-19 virus – especially when social distancing rules are eventually relaxed.
The aggregated data could also prove to be useful when public health officials try and target specific geographical areas in relation to urgent public health-related messages which are aimed at saving peoples lives.
This latest announcement comes as big tech companies do what they can to try and help the emergency services and healthcare planners to contain the spread of COVID-19.
Globally, 56,253 people have died after becoming infected with COVID-19 (WHO figures), and over 1 million people have now been infected with the virus that originated from a live meat market in Wuhan, China.
The World Health Organisation estimates that 208,385 people have recovered from COVID-19.
To see how well your local community is adhering to social distancing rules, visit: google.com/covid19/mobility/
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