High-resolution satellite images show Ebola spread
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Ebola is visible from space: you can see its effects. Satellite imagery that provide high-resolution pictures from low Earth orbit give a picture of where more sick people are showing up. A sudden Ebola outbreak, viewed from space, may look like an unusually crowded hospital parking lot and so on.
Researchers worldwide have created numerous models to predict parking lot occupancy, as it relates to peak influenza cases. They found that they could predict influenza peaks with a mean square error rate of .0074, which is generally considered a very good result.
Of course, a hospital parking lot during flu season is very different from one in Liberia during an Ebola outbreak, but that doesn’t mean the factors are invisible. They’re just more difficult to trace.
DigitalGlobe sells high-resolution satellites images to the government and also provides analysis on satellite intel. Dr. Colleen McCue, DigitalGlobe’s senior director of social science and quantitative research, does predictive analytic research based on indicators visible form space.
McCue says that unknowns can be accounted for, somewhat, by combining better human behavior models with satellite imagery models. Yes, she says, Ebola movement can be predicted with enough data. “We can incorporate hundreds of variables, as they are available to understand the environment.” Some of these questions she would consider in analyzing how Ebola spreads, can include the ways terrain, political factors, infrastructure and even culture could influence where people are going to seek help.
According to McCue, one “scary vector,” or factor, in the current outbreak is how people use cabs and taxis to arrive at hospitals. “Someone’s sick, they call a cab to take them to the hospital, they may be shedding the virus [via fluids] in the cab. They reach the hospital and there’s no beds; then they go home and they’ve contaminated these cabs.” It’s the sort of subtle clue you can catch from space, with enough time, patience and, most importantly, attention.
