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NASA Space Science

NASA Satellites to Predict Disease Outbreaks 67

Posted by samzenpus from the doctor-eye-in-the-sky dept.
coondoggie writes "NASA and its Applied Sciences Program will be using 14 satellites to watch the Earth's environment and help predict and prevent infectious disease outbreaks around the world. Through orbiting satellites, data is collected daily to monitor environmental changes. That information is then passed on to agencies such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Department of Defense who then apply the data to predict and track disease outbreaks and assist in making public health policy decisions. The use of remote sensing technology helps scientists predict the outbreak of some of the most common and deadly infectious diseases such as Ebola, West Nile virus and Rift Valley Fever."
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NASA Satellites to Predict Disease Outbreaks More

NASA Satellites to Predict Disease Outbreaks

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  • Ebola, West Nile, Rift Valley (Score:3, Interesting)

    by BadAnalogyGuy ( 945258 ) <BadAnalogyGuy@gmail.com> on Thursday November 08, 2007 @12:37AM (#21277583)
    What do these things have in common? Africa.

    What's the deal with all these weird diseases originating in that dark continent? Why do we not get such terrible diseases from the jungles of South America, for instance?

    • Re: (Score:1, Insightful)

      by timmarhy ( 659436 )
      good question.

      I suspect it's to do with the poor living conditions of the people and their close proximity to wild animals.

      remmeber asia is also a vector for deseases crossing the species barrier due to the fact humans there live in crowded homes with their livestock. eg. SARS which came from chickens.

      when a virus crosses a species barrier it's suddenly found a new host without defenses and who isn't adapted to it, so it spreads like wild fire and kills quickly.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Zekasu ( 1059298 )
      Actually, weren't there (at the least) a few diseases that originated from South America?

      The whole mass amount of jungle-life, sweltering heat and humid environment could, even though I'm not a specialist in this, harbor the right conditions for that sort of bacteria or virus.

      I mean, any habitat with disease-carrying insects will have a spread of disease.
    • I'd say that tropical is the common element. Thanks to climate change, I expect that to be a more common element these days. Perhaps the tropics of South America have less human population? I am not informed as to why that could be pertinent. I thought all the weird shit came out of China.

    • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

      by verySmartApe ( 1053716 )
      It's true, most of the viral hemorrhagic fevers come from Africa. But there is Machupo.
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machupo_virus [wikipedia.org] You didn't even mention Lassa or Marburg virus. But these scary viruses actually aren't that dangerous to most people. They are too good at killing, so they don't spread. I'm more worried about a flu pandemic.
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_flu [wikipedia.org]
      And where did that originate? Probably SE Asia, but it's impossible to say. Probably not Africa, though.
      • Isn't Marburg a strain of Ebola? But: bird Flu comes from Asia. The Plague (yeah that's an old one) came from Asia.
    • And don't forget http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sin_Nombre_virus [wikipedia.org], a type of hantavirus. Remember where that started? New Mexico.
      • Long before sin nombre, when folks there only worried about bubonic plague, you could buy t-shirts in New Mexico that read "Land of the flea, home of the plague." Now you have sin nombre, plague, and a random anthrax outbreak or two. Guess it was good they taught us in school: "Don't pick up dead animals."

    • What's the deal with all these weird diseases originating in that dark continent?


      For one thing, Africa is a BIG place, with high temperatures, etc.

      More importantly though... people are dying of AIDS and starvation, and we do nothing about it. What do you expect to happen, when you ignore an entire continent's need of help. The answer is: it comes back and bites you in the ass.
    • There are no apes in South America.
    • The planet-crippling virus Homo Sapiens is also thought to have originated there, btw.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by MyRuger ( 443241 )
      The diseases in South America kill you before you can reach civilization to spread them!!

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by justo ( 2858 )
      maybe the dod is using africa as a petrie dish? *puts on tinfoil nanoskin*

  • Hmmm.... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by kcbanner ( 929309 ) * on Thursday November 08, 2007 @12:40AM (#21277607) Homepage Journal

    That information is then passed on to agencies such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Department of Defense
    Hmmm. So they are doing hardcore surveillance, but thats ok because its for saving the world...why does it need to be sent to the DoD? Hmm.
    • When they say that are doing it to predict and prevent, they really mean they are going to start it and help spread it.

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Nyeerrmm ( 940927 )
      Because the DOD has a large number of people around the world, and they want to be able to be prepared for them, since military bases and camps can be hotbeds for disease.

    • Hmmm. So they are doing hardcore surveillance, but thats ok because its for saving the world...why does it need to be sent to the DoD? Hmm.
      I thought that was obvious, they need to make sure there little creations are working as planned.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Instine ( 963303 )
      A few years ago I would have said you were paranoid. Now... Yes there are good reasons for a DoD to know this kind of information. But now that the DoD is becoming a DoA (dept of Agression), we all worry about giving it yet more power... A shame realy.

    • Re: (Score:1, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Since the US needs to control the world to keep it safe for corporations, we have military bases all over the world to protect 'US Interests'... Also, disease outbreaks are convenient for 'softening up' areas that are showing resistance to US corporate interests. The shock of a disease outbreak can provide an opening for US 'assistance' in opening markets. We can start with humanitarian assistance, food and medicine (US brand only), then move to other goods and services... but only if the country is willi
    • There is no 'hardcore' surveillance going on. These are weather and climatology satellites. They're using AVHRR [dundee.ac.uk] and MODIS [nasa.gov] data to model when conditions are ripe for insect outbreaks that can carry malaria. The best resolution in the study appears to be 250 meters, so it isn't capable of picking out individual houses, let alone spying on people.

      It's sent to the DoD because they have a centralized database that combines these 14 satellites, coregisters them with each other, and turns them into one product.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by neepey ( 1186295 )
      I'm glad someone is finally making plans in case there is a zombie takeover...

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Venik ( 915777 )
      I guess the data goes to DoD just in case they detect some really nasty weather and they need to bomb it real quick. Nothing to worry about.
  • I can't get a reliable weather forecast, how the hell do they expect to follow climate change to determine disease outbreak?

  • Open API? (Score:5, Funny)

    by hmccabe ( 465882 ) on Thursday November 08, 2007 @12:59AM (#21277745)
    I want a google maps mashup that tells me who in my neighborhood has herpes.

    • I want a google maps mashup that tells me who in my neighborhood has herpes.
      Just get a job at the health department and you can do it on their intranet.. just click "Intranet -> Diseases -> Who's Got The Clap -> Search by Suburb", and make sure you check the "Show me on a Map" box. Oh and the Community Comments feature on it is hilarious!
    • "ding dong. turn left in two miles to avoid heavy traffic on the freeway. but avoid the thruway, as there is an rift valley fever outbreak downtown. ding dong"
    • I like the idea, but I think the challenge of finding a suitably euphemistic name for the project is a big drawback to its commercial success.
      I mean, Google STD Search Engine probably isn't going to sell too well.
    • Why, when stereotyping is much fun? (That crazy cat lady has syphillus... that explains so much!)
  • So no more bird flu excitement, generating $Bs for consultants and drug companies, only rational pandemic decisions based on hard facts. Should be good.

  • something similar has done before (Score:4, Informative)

    by holywarrior21c ( 933929 ) on Thursday November 08, 2007 @01:50AM (#21278045)
    Live tropical sea surface temperature on the web http://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/vis/a000000/a003300/a003376/ [nasa.gov]
    El nino linked to deadly disease http://www.spacedaily.com/news/pacific-02a.html [spacedaily.com]
  • Better than a vacation on Mars anyway.
  • And the odds of the terms "Global Warming" or "Climate Change" being used in connection with any of this data will be about the same as the odds of me getting into a three-way with Jessica Alba and Angelina Jolie.

  • Very Effective Use of Realtime Climate Data (Score:4, Interesting)

    by JustinianV ( 1001348 ) on Thursday November 08, 2007 @04:03AM (#21278679)
    Often the ideal conditions for an outbreak of Malaria, West Nile, etc. are tied to climate factors such as rainfall and temperature. This is because of the nature of the transmission vectors of these diseases, namely insects, obviously the mosquito, particularly the Anopheles gambiae which carries the more deadly form of the malaria parasite. I've used interpolated averaged (read: doubly inaccurate) climate information (rainfall, temperature) to rather accurately map the areas where malarial outbreaks would occur in Eritrea (a country in NE Africa, next to Ethiopia). Creating a model utilizing real-time climate statistics aided by local reporting could seriously assist in the fight against malaria in sub-Saharan Africa, I only hope the information is put in the hands of the right people.
  • obesity, of course - worst dieses in the history of the human race. (Obesity = combination of plaque, TB and AIDS on steroids).
    But there is a way out!
    Every time this new satellite spots a McDonald's or KFC opening somewhere in the world, USAF bombs it to obesity oblivion.

    I can even see the promotional campaign:

    ''Fighting humanity problems with JDAM's''
  • DoD: You see - we are putting this network of satellites which will be watching you 24/7 so that we can see if there is a mosquito and rodents creeping up on you.
    Joe Average: You can spot a mosquito? Cool! But wait... won't that be invasion of privacy?
    DoD: LOL! No. See... we can't spot a mosquito - we can only see larger things like "environment" and then try to guess where they will go.
    Joe Average: But you can are still monitoring the world 24/7?
    DoD: Well... yeah. But its for your own good.
    Joe Average: But
  • If the NASA satellites can see diseases, just imagine how good the spy satellites are.
  • Is a "Doctor Evil Super Grand Master Global Command Center" like this really useful? It seems to me, that this kind of thing is more of a TV prop than a real tool.

    I'm under the impression, that in the past (before the 1950's) we slowed the spread of diseases with isolation (Quarantine). After the 50's, we eliminated most bacterial diseases with sanitation and vaccination.

    How exactly does a satellite image show the spread of disease?
  • test

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