Role of AI in fighting COVID-19

The world is fighting COVID-19, and every bit of technological ingenuity and innovation harnesses to fight the pandemic is bringing us a step closer to overcoming it. Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence(AI) play a crucial role in better addressing and understanding the COVID-19 crisis. Machine learning mimics human intelligence to identify patterns and data insights. In the battle against COVID-19, organizations have been quickly applying their machine learning expertise in different areas: understanding how COVID-19 spreads, scaling customer communications, and speeding up treatment and research. 

The healthcare across the globe has suffered a significant blow against COVID-19 management. The pandemic has proved challenging in identifying the COVID patients and the diagnosis of the disease. The use of Artificial Intelligence has rendered the government and health workers for solutions that can stall this roadblock. An AI expert can use the technology of powerful algorithms to process the data and identify patterns. Thus, for the success of any Artificial Intelligence, big data is necessary. 

 

Table of Contents

 

  • Role of AI
  • Tracing and Treatment
  • Research
  • Conclusion

 

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Role of AI

 

Clinical researchers and physicians have been using AI and machine learning algorithms to support various projects for several years. Naturally, those technologies were incorporated in addressing the COVID-19 pandemic. The most crucial factor in understanding and containing the virus is to know who has it and when. This has been the most significant barrier in many areas due to the time gap between symptoms and infection and the lack of a powerful tracking program to identify potential interactions and conditions. AI is being used to address COVID-19 by helping doctors better understand the patients, who are likely to have gotten it or get it in the future from sick individuals, and use these findings to ensure proper resources are available to those who need it most. Healthcare centers and hospitals are using healthcare mobile app development solutions to cope with COVID-19. 

 

Data is being captured at a fast rate, including hospital triage, search patterns, and mobile device data to identify sick people’s location, public perception, and response to the development of infections. AI can quickly parse large datasets captured from medical data, cameras, and mobile devices and create a viable map to inform those decisions. 

 

Tracing and Treatment

 

In April, the two big tech giants-Google and Apple colluded to develop a contract-based app to trace the patients of COVID-19.  The application works on Bluetooth and has been employed in western countries mostly. A similar strategy is being used in India in the form of the Aarogya Setu app. In June, the UN was told by India that contact tracing apps and drones have helped India manage COVID cases. The app uses location data and Bluetooth to let the user know of suspected COVID-19 patients nearby. The app is developed in 12 languages, and the user database is growing day by day. 

 

Other mobile applications such as Sampark-o-meter and GoCoronaGo have also been developed for contact tracing Indian Institute of Science (IISc) and IITs. In Odisha, the infringement of rules in containment zones has been checked by drones developed by the state health department’s cooperation with the IT industry. AI has also facilitated manual repurposing of drugs to treat COVID-19 as the coronavirus progresses. An AI model has been developed by IIIT to repurpose medicines according to their success probability against the disease instead of manually undertaking the process. AI technology is also being used by Tata Consultancy Services to crunch down the large molecule of drugs into highly effective molecules against the disease to reduce the process’s time duration. 

 

Alongside AI has been proven effective in providing Tele-Consultation, one consultation, and Tele-medicines with health experts concerning a particular ailment. AI has also proven to be a success in terms of online training of the medics for controlling the COVID-19 pandemic. Robots are being used to deliver hand sanitizers and public health messages at the entrance of isolation wards and office buildings to combat COVID-19. 

 

The Stanford and IIT alumni came up with a solution for disinfecting public spaces. They developed a machine that controls the spread of the virus by ionizing the corona discharge. 

 

Research

 

Researchers and healthcare providers are faced with an exponentially increasing volume of information about COVID-19. This has made it difficult to derive insights that can inform treatment. As a response, CORD-19 Search was launched by AWS- a search website powered by Machine Learning that can help researchers easily and quickly search for documents and research papers and answer questions of the hour. The Allen Institute built the AI’s CORD-19 open research dataset of 128,000 plus research papers and other materials. This solution of Machine Learning extracts relevant medical information from unstructured text and delivers powerful natural-language query capabilities helping accelerate the power of discovery. In the medical imaging field, researchers use machine learning to help recognize patterns in images and enhance radiologists’ ability to indicate the probability of disease and diagnosis. 

 

A new method had been engineered by UC San Diego Health to diagnose pneumonia- a condition associated with severe COVID-19. Early detection helps doctors. UC San Diego Health has engineered a new method to diagnose pneumonia earlier, a condition associated with severe COVID-19. This early detection helps doctors quickly identify the appropriate level of care even before COVID-19 diagnosis is confirmed. A machine learning algorithm was trained with 22,000 notations by human radiologists that overlay color-coded maps and x-rays that indicate pneumonia probability. The credits donated from the AWS Diagnostic Development Initiative have helped deploy methods for a chest x-ray and CT scan. 

 

Conclusion

The healthcare sectors are in dire need of innovative technologies for decision-making to handle the COVID-19 epidemic globally and help them in getting the right recommendations in real-time to stay away from the spread. IoT, AI, and Machine Learning work in a professional way to mimic human intelligence. It also plays a crucial role in suggesting and understanding the development of a COVID-19 vaccine. This result-driven technology properly screens, predicts, analyzes, and tracks current patients and future patients also. An AI certification is your first step to entering this domain and work for future pandemics.