Use Google to Track the Flu
Did you ever wish there was a way to track the influenza virus in your area online?
Thanks to Google, you can do just that.
How?
Millions of users around the world search for online health information. As you might expect, there are more online flu-related searches during the flu season. Google Flu Trends uses computers to crunch millions of Internet searches people make for keywords that might be related to the flu — for instance “cough,” or “fever.” It displays the results on a map of the U.S. and shows a chart of changes in flu activity around the country.
Why does it matter?
What actually makes the data meaningful is that the Google arm that created Flu Trends found a strong correlation between the number of Internet searches related to the flu and the number of people reporting flu symptoms.
Google built the service with the guidance of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the U.S. government’s public-health watchdog that runs a range of flu-surveillance systems. Flu Trends can be a complement to those tools, health officials say.
This sound like a powerful tool for any business, school or household.