How AI Spotted and Tracked the Coronavirus Outbreak 人工智能是如何尋找和跟蹤冠狀病毒疫情的
John McCormick 約翰·麥科米克
Artificial intelligence is helping epidemiologists identify and track outbreaks faster and more precisely than ever before-including the spread of the new coronavirus that emerged in Wuhan， China.
A small Toronto-based company that tracks infectious disease， BlueDot Inc.， used AI developed in house to send an alert about the coronavirus outbreak the week before major health agencies issued notifications. BlueDot also accurately predicted where the virus would go next.
BlueDot’s AI tool， developed in 2018， serves as “an early warning system” that can quickly detect an outbreak by using AI to analyze information from official and nonofficial sources for relevant words and phrases， said Kamran Khan， BlueDot’s founder and chief executive.
The BlueDot system gathers information from sources including:
·more than 100，000 news articles from local and international newspapers in 65 languages each day，
·official reports from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention， World Health Organization， Food and Agriculture Organization and the World Organization for Animal Health，
·real-time climate data from satellites，
·flight information and anonymized flight itinerary data from the International Air Transport Association， a trade group that represents airlines，
·information from government sources， including data on human populations， insects that can transmit infectious diseases， the number of doctors and nurses per capita in an area， and information on economic and political conditions around the world.
The data flows into a central repository that also contains details about more than 150 pathogens.
In the case of the coronavirus， BlueDot’s system spotted a number of signals， including references to things like “undiagnosed pneumonia” in Wuhan.
The company’s AI system accurately predicted that the virus would spread next to Bangkok， Hong Kong， Tokyo and other cities by analyzing transportation data on where people fly from Wuhan.
The advancement of AI is giving society the ability to respond to outbreaks much more rapidly， said Laura Craft， a vice president and analyst at research and advisory company Gartner Inc.
人工智能正在幫助流行病學家以比以往任何時候都更快、更精確的方式發現和跟蹤疫情，包括在中國武漢出現的新型冠狀病毒疫情。
總部位于多倫多、跟蹤傳染病的小公司藍點公司在主要衛生機構發布通報的一周前就利用內部開發的人工智能系統發出了冠狀病毒疫情警報。藍點公司還准確預測了病毒的下一步走向。
藍點公司的創始人兼首席執行官卡姆蘭·汗說，藍點公司2018年開發的人工智能工具起到了“預警系統”的作用，能利用人工智能對官方和非官方消息源的信息進行分析，找出相關的詞彙和短語，從而迅速發現疫情。
藍點公司的系統搜集信息時的來源包括：
·國內外65種語言的報紙每天刊登的超過10萬篇新聞稿；
·美國疾病控制和預防中心、世界衛生組織、聯合國糧農組織和世界動物衛生組織的官方報告；
·衛星實時氣候數據；
·從航空公司行業組織國際航空運輸協會獲取的航班信息和隱匿了姓名的航班行程數據；
·來自政府消息源的信息，包括人口數據、可傳播傳染病的昆蟲數據、某地區人均擁有的醫生和護士數量以及世界各地的經濟和政治形勢。
這些數據被輸入一個中央存儲器，其中還包含超過150種病原體的詳細信息。
對于這場新型冠狀病毒疫情，藍點公司的系統檢測到許多信號，包括有關武漢“不明原因肺炎”的說法。
公司的人工智能系統通過分析人們乘機離開武漢去外地的交通數據，准確預測出該病毒接下來將擴散到曼谷、香港、東京等城市。
研究和咨詢公司加特納公司的副總裁兼分析師勞拉·克拉夫特表示，人工智能的進步將使社會能夠更快地對疫情作出反應。（塗颀譯自美國《華爾街日報》2月6日文章）