Importance of Artificial Intelligence in the Modern World
Since the world has gone into lockdown, the scientific research community is trying to understand the nature of COVID-19 along with the way of its spread, and finding a vaccine. Do you know that they are carrying out research with the help of technology? Artificial Intelligence has always been working behind the scenes to assist the limitations of human knowledge in this huge endeavor. Let’s describe briefly how it is being done with the help of AI.
Machine Learning is the main driving force behind AI. Machine learning takes a huge amount of data, called Big Data, and helps in learning the data pattern. It not only helps to reveal the insights about the data, but also assists in the learning of the data pattern. For example, it is possible to predict the number of deaths of males as a result of Covid-19 in a particular country.
BlueDot, a Canadian AI company, has developed an AI program that is alerting the world to Coronavirus after the first case was detected on 31st December 2019 in China. This program was designed for the prediction of infectious diseases and for the location and tracking of their spreads. It works through the combination of AI and knowledge of epidemiologists who identify where and how to search for evidence of emerging diseases. BlueDot produces analysis of over 100,000 reports on a daily basis in multiple languages and is sending regular alerts to government, business and healthcare departments.
Help with Image Scan Analysis & Reducing the Workload of Hospital Staff
While fighting against Covid-19 testing has been the key issue. South Korea and Germany have been successful in handling the virus due to the increasing amount of testing facilities in their countries. The health authorities have been keenly interested in increasing the testing numbers, but the testing is not only time consuming but also requires intensive labor. However, AI has been combined with other forms of testing like x-ray scanning. A combination of various AI programs are used for chest screening, to highlight the lung abnormalities in the chest X-ray scan, hence providing risk evaluation of COVID19 is much quicker than human radiologists.
Minimizing Human Contact Through Robots Using AI
In recent months, a wide range of AI-based robots have emerged that are helping to battle Covid-19 by minimizing the contact between health care workers and patients, hence reducing any risk of cross infections.
Contact Tracing Apps
Contact tracing apps are widely being used in Asia, including countries like China, Hong Kong, Singapore, and South Korea. Due to these apps, the whereabouts of smartphone users are detectable and therefore, can easily detect any close contact with other users. The risk of cross-infection can be determined by AI algorithms, and then other users can be alerted about the risks. For example, the British government has trialed an app that uses a Bluetooth protocol for the identification of smartphone owners living in close proximity to each other. Hence, a person who has not been infected, but is living in close proximity to someone with symptoms of Covid-19, will immediately receive an alert.
Conclusion
AI has played a significant role in fighting this pandemic. In various healthcare apps, artificial intelligence has been adopted to deal with Covid-19 effectively. When the battle with this deadly virus is over, it is anticipated that AI will become a lot more prominent over the next few years in healthcare systems globally.
