How AI Spotted and Tracked the Coronavirus Outbreak 人工智能是如何寻找和跟踪冠状病毒疫情的
John McCormick 约翰·麦科米克
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.
人工智能正在帮助流行病学家以比以往任何时候都更快、更精确的方式发现和跟踪疫情，包括在中国武汉出现的新型冠状病毒疫情。
总部位于多伦多、跟踪传染病的小公司蓝点公司在主要卫生机构发布通报的一周前就利用内部开发的人工智能系统发出了冠状病毒疫情警报。蓝点公司还准确预测了病毒的下一步走向。
蓝点公司的创始人兼首席执行官卡姆兰·汗说，蓝点公司2018年开发的人工智能工具起到了“预警系统”的作用，能利用人工智能对官方和非官方消息源的信息进行分析，找出相关的词汇和短语，从而迅速发现疫情。
蓝点公司的系统搜集信息时的来源包括：
·国内外65种语言的报纸每天刊登的超过10万篇新闻稿；
·美国疾病控制和预防中心、世界卫生组织、联合国粮农组织和世界动物卫生组织的官方报告；
·卫星实时气候数据；
·从航空公司行业组织国际航空运输协会获取的航班信息和隐匿了姓名的航班行程数据；
·来自政府消息源的信息，包括人口数据、可传播传染病的昆虫数据、某地区人均拥有的医生和护士数量以及世界各地的经济和政治形势。
这些数据被输入一个中央存储器，其中还包含超过150种病原体的详细信息。
对于这场新型冠状病毒疫情，蓝点公司的系统检测到许多信号，包括有关武汉“不明原因肺炎”的说法。
公司的人工智能系统通过分析人们乘机离开武汉去外地的交通数据，准确预测出该病毒接下来将扩散到曼谷、香港、东京等城市。
研究和咨询公司加特纳公司的副总裁兼分析师劳拉·克拉夫特表示，人工智能的进步将使社会能够更快地对疫情作出反应。（涂颀译自美国《华尔街日报》2月6日文章）