WHO Digital Intelligence Analysis for Tracking Narratives and Information Voids in the COVID-19 Infodemic

The COVID-19 pandemic is the first to unfold in the highly digitalized society of the 21st century and is therefore the first pandemic to benefit from and be threatened by a thriving real-time digital information ecosystem. For this reason, the response to the infodemic required development of a public health social listening taxonomy, a structure that can simplify the chaotic information ecosystem to enable an adaptable monitoring infrastructure that detects signals of fertile ground for misinformation and guides trusted sources of verified information to fill in information voids in a timely manner. A weekly analysis of public online conversations since 23 March 2020 has enabled the quantification of running shifts of public interest in public health-related topics concerning the pandemic and has demonstrated the frequent resumption of information voids relevant for public health interventions and risk communication in an emergency response setting.

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Cost–utility analysis of public health interventions

Applied Health Economics for Public Health Practice and Research ◽

10.1093/med/9780198737483.003.0008 ◽

2019 ◽

pp. 177-203

Author(s):

Rhiannon T. Edwards ◽

Eira Winrow

Keyword(s):

Public Health ◽

United Kingdom ◽

Cost Utility ◽

Cost Utility Analysis ◽

Health Interventions ◽

Utility Analysis ◽

Public Health Interventions ◽

The United Kingdom ◽

Related Quality ◽

Health Related

This chapter builds upon Chapters 2 and 6 by introducing the reader to the history and concepts of health-related quality of life, cost–utility analysis, quality-adjusted life years (QALYs), and payer thresholds. The aim of this chapter is to outline in more depth the role of applied cost–utility analyses in the economic evaluation of public health interventions. The chapter goes on to reproduce a paper by Owen and colleagues at the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) in the United Kingdom. This paper shows that many public health interventions often have a cost per QALY considerably lower than the £20,000 payer threshold conventionally used by NICE in the United Kingdom.

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Immunizing Against Prejudice

Psychological Science ◽

10.1177/0956797611417261 ◽

2011 ◽

Vol 22 (12) ◽

pp. 1550-1556 ◽

Cited By ~ 68

Author(s):

Julie Y. Huang ◽

Alexandra Sedlovskaya ◽

Joshua M. Ackerman ◽

John A. Bargh

Keyword(s):

Public Health ◽

Health Interventions ◽

Hand Washing ◽

Public Health Interventions ◽

Disease Avoidance ◽

Behavioral Immune System ◽

Psychological Mechanisms ◽

Health Related ◽

Group Members ◽

The Relationship

Contemporary interpersonal biases are partially derived from psychological mechanisms that evolved to protect people against the threat of contagious disease. This behavioral immune system effectively promotes disease avoidance but also results in an overgeneralized prejudice toward people who are not legitimate carriers of disease. In three studies, we tested whether experiences with two modern forms of disease protection (vaccination and hand washing) attenuate the relationship between concerns about disease and prejudice against out-groups. Study 1 demonstrated that when threatened with disease, vaccinated participants exhibited less prejudice toward immigrants than unvaccinated participants did. In Study 2, we found that framing vaccination messages in terms of immunity eliminated the relationship between chronic germ aversion and prejudice. In Study 3, we directly manipulated participants’ protection from disease by having some participants wash their hands and found that this intervention significantly influenced participants’ perceptions of out-group members. Our research suggests that public-health interventions can benefit society in areas beyond immediate health-related domains by informing novel, modern remedies for prejudice.

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The role of risk communication in public health interventions. An analysis of risk communication for a community quarantine in Germany to curb the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic

PLoS ONE ◽

10.1371/journal.pone.0256113 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 16 (8) ◽

pp. e0256113

Author(s):

Juliane Scholz ◽

Wibke Wetzker ◽

Annika Licht ◽

Rainer Heintzmann ◽

André Scherag ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Public Health ◽

Risk Communication ◽

Public Health Intervention ◽

Health Interventions ◽

Successful Implementation ◽

Public Health Interventions ◽

Cross Sectional Survey ◽

Cross Sectional ◽

Information Level ◽

Public Health Authorities

Background Separating ill or possibly infectious people from their healthy community is one of the core principles of non-pharmaceutical interventions. However, there is scarce evidence on how to successfully implement quarantine orders. We investigated a community quarantine for an entire village in Germany (Neustadt am Rennsteig, March 2020) with the aim of better understanding the successful implementation of quarantine measures. Methods This cross-sectional survey was conducted in Neustadt am Rennsteig six weeks after the end of a 14-day mandatory community quarantine. The sample size consisted of 562 adults (64% of the community), and the response rate was 295 adults, or 52% (33% of the community). Findings National television was reported as the most important channel of information. Contact with local authorities was very limited, and partners or spouses played a more important role in sharing information. Generally, the self-reported information level was judged to be good (211/289 [73.0%]). The majority of participants (212/289 [73.4%]) approved of the quarantine, and the reported compliance was 217/289 (75.1%). A self-reported higher level of concern as well as a higher level of information correlated positively with both a greater acceptance of quarantine and self-reported compliant behaviour. Interpretation The community quarantine presented a rare opportunity to investigate a public health intervention for an entire community. In order to improve the implementation of public health interventions, public health risk communication activities should be intensified to increase both the information level (potentially leading to better compliance with community quarantine) and the communication level (to facilitate rapport and trust between public health authorities and their communities).

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Role of Social Media in vaccination debate about HPV: the VAC Medi+Board study

European Journal of Public Health ◽

10.1093/eurpub/ckz186.084 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 29 (Supplement_4) ◽

Author(s):

D Artus ◽

H Larson ◽

P Kostkova

Keyword(s):

Public Health ◽

Social Media ◽

Real Time ◽

Hpv Vaccine ◽

Information Diffusion ◽

Health Interventions ◽

Vaccine Uptake ◽

Public Health Interventions ◽

The Government

Abstract Background Whilst it has long been known that anti-vaccination sentiment is widely disseminated through digital networks, 2019 has seen seismic shifts in the landscape. As viral videos originating on Youtube spread across social networks, HPV vaccine uptake tumbled in a number of countries. In Japan, the government came under sufficient pressure that they de-recommended HPV vaccine, seeing a 70% uptake rate in 2013 fall below 1%. However, there have been some reports of successful interventions - a recent campaign run by the HPV Alliance in Ireland has seen a rate back up to a national average of around 75%. A combination of hard-hitting personal testimonials, social media and traditional media looked to promote the HPV vaccine. Methods Social media platforms such as Twitter enable near real-time understandings of vaccine sentiment and information flows at scale. VAC Medi+Board project developed an innovative approach for Twitter data collection, integration, analysis and visualisation to support rapid responses through identifying key influencers and flashpoints in articles about vaccination going viral. Results This pilot study evaluated the debate about HPV on Twitter in a period of several month and developed methods for analysis and visualisation of the content, key influencers, information diffusion throughout the network and size of audience. Through complex network analysis, VAC Medi+Board piloted identification of individuals for targeted public health interventions to combat misinformation. Conclusions In this talk, we will present the VAC Medi+Board HPV study and explore the challenges and opportunities that social media can provide for public health policymakers. Key messages Analysis and graphical visualisation of HPV debate on Twitter to support targeted public health interventions at real-time. Contributing to better understanding the role of social media in the complex picture of vaccines hesitancy.

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The virtuous epidemiologist

Journal of Public Health ◽

10.1093/pubmed/fdy198 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 41 (4) ◽

pp. 864-869

Author(s):

E C Ip

Keyword(s):

Public Health ◽

Virtue Ethics ◽

Moral Philosophy ◽

Public Interest ◽

Health Interventions ◽

Individual Rights ◽

Public Health Interventions ◽

The Public ◽

Principles And Standards

Abstract This article addresses the scholarly gap in the ethics of epidemiology by exploring what virtue ethics, one of the oldest ethical traditions in moral philosophy, has to say about ‘the virtuous epidemiologist’. It expounds comparatively the content and merits of a virtue ethics approach against more popular contemporary schools of thought such as consequentialism and deontology. Without necessarily dismissing the value of principles and standards, it presents a vision that a virtuous epidemiologist should cultivate wisdom in making prudential judgments in conditions of uncertainty; fortitude in dealing with powerful politicians and administrators which does not sacrifice truth; temperance and self-restraint in keeping one’s ideological views from compromising one’s scientific credibility; and justice in giving due weight to individual rights and the public interest when doing research and giving advice on public health interventions.

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The Real-time Effect of Public Health Interventions on the COVID-19 Epidemic in Hubei Province

Journal of Data Science ◽

10.6339/jds.202012_18(5).0006 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 18 (5) ◽

pp. 907-921

Author(s):

Jiamin Liu ◽

Ze Chen ◽

Yanyan Ouyang ◽

Xu Guo ◽

Wangli Xu

Keyword(s):

Public Health ◽

Real Time ◽

Hubei Province ◽

Time Effect ◽

Health Interventions ◽

Public Health Interventions ◽

The Real

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Lifecourse Socio-economic Mobility and Oral Health in Middle Age

Journal of Dental Research ◽

10.1177/0022034509344524 ◽

2009 ◽

Vol 88 (10) ◽

pp. 938-941 ◽

Cited By ~ 30

Author(s):

M.S. Pearce ◽

W.M. Thomson ◽

A.W.G. Walls ◽

J.G. Steele

Keyword(s):

Public Health ◽

Oral Health ◽

Middle Age ◽

Health Interventions ◽

Public Health Interventions ◽

The Public ◽

Wide Range ◽

Related Quality ◽

Health Related ◽

Using Data

Socio-economic variations in health exist for a wide range of health outcomes, including oral health and oral-health-related quality of life (OHRQoL). Less is known regarding how socio-economic trajectories may influence oral health and OHRQoL. This study examined whether social mobility is related to the number of teeth retained by age 50 years and OHRQoL measured at the same time, using data from the Newcastle Thousand Families Study, a birth cohort established in 1947. Women remaining in the non-manual class had the greatest tooth retention. While promotion of a healthier lifestyle and continued improvements in oral hygiene throughout life appear to be the public health interventions most likely to improve oral health into middle age, there may be sub-groups of the population on which different approaches in terms of public health interventions need to be focused.

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A Noel Intervention Recurrent autoencoder for real time forecasting and non-pharmaceutical intervention selection to curb the spread of Covid-19 in the world

10.1101/2020.05.05.20091827 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Qiyang Ge ◽

Zixin Hu ◽

Shudi Li ◽

Wei Lin ◽

Li Jin ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Public Health ◽

Causal Inference ◽

Real Time ◽

Health Planning ◽

Health Interventions ◽

List Type ◽

Public Health Interventions ◽

Peak Number ◽

Additional Intervention ◽

The World

ABSTRACTObjectiveDevelop the AI and casual inference-inspired methods for forecasting and evaluating the effects of public health interventions on curbing the spread of Covid-19.MethodsWe developed recurrent neural network (RNN) for modeling the transmission dynamics of the epidemics and Counterfactual-RNN (CRNN) for evaluating and exploring public health intervention strategies to slow down the spread of Covid-19 worldwide. We applied the developed methods to real-time forecasting the confirmed cases of Covid-19 across the world. The data were collected from January 22 to April 18, 2020 by John Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center (https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/MAP.HTML).ResultsThe average errors of 1-step to 10-step forecasting were 2.9%. In the absence of a COVID-19 vaccine, we evaluated the potential effects of a number of public health measures. We found that the estimated peak number of new cases and cumulative cases, and the maximum number of cumulative cases worldwide with one week later additional intervention were reduced to 103,872, 2,104,800, and 2,271,648, respectively. The estimated total peak number of new cases and cumulative cases would be the same as the above and the maximum number of cumulative cases would be 3,864,872 in the world with 3 week later additional intervention. Duration time of the Covid-19 spread would be increased from 91 days to 123 days. Our estimation results showed that we were in the eve of stopping the spread of COVID-19 worldwide. However, we observed that transmission would quickly rebound if interventions were relaxed.ConclusionsThe accuracy of the AI-based methods for forecasting the trajectory of Covid-19 was high. The AI and causal inference-inspired methods are a powerful tool for helping public health planning and policymaking. We concluded that the spread of COVID-19 would be stopped very soon.HighlightsAs the Covid-19 pandemic soars around the world, there is urgent need to forecast the number of cases worldwide at its peak, the length of the pandemic before receding and implement public health interventions to significantly stop the spread of Covid-19.Develop artificial intelligence (AI) and causal inference inspired methods for real-time forecasting and evaluation of interventions on the worldwide trajectory of the spread of Covid-19.We estimated the maximum number of cumulative cases under immediate additional intervention to be 2,271,648; under later additional intervention the number increased to 3,864,872 and the case ending time would be May 25, 2020.Without additional intervention, the spread of COVID-19 would be stopped on July 6, 2020.

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COVID-19 epidemic modelling and the effect of public health interventions in India- SEIQHRF model

10.1101/2020.09.16.20182915 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Pooja Sengupta ◽

Bhaswati Ganguli ◽

Aditya Chatterjee ◽

Sugata SenRoy ◽

Moumita Chatterjee

Keyword(s):

Public Health ◽

Real Time ◽

Intervention Strategies ◽

Health Interventions ◽

Epidemic Modeling ◽

Time Data ◽

Public Health Interventions ◽

Indian States ◽

Epidemic Modelling ◽

Real Time Data

A dynamic epidemic modeling, based on real time data, of COVID19 has been attempted for India and few selected Indian states . Various scenarios of intervention strategies to contain the spread of the disease are explored.

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