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Development of a Real-Time Infectious Disease Surveillance and Response System for Pakistan: Responding to Human Well-Being in Times of Threat

US Investigators:  Dave Ebert, A. Ghafoor (PI), R. Maciejewski, W. Aref, S. Grannis Pakistan Investigators:  M. Ahmed, M.N. Ayyaz

Sponsor: Defense Threat Reduction Agency

Abstract: Lack of a robust infrastructure for timely collection, reporting and analyses of infectious diseases undermines epidemic preparedness and poses serious health challenges and security threats to the general public in Pakistan. With the growing security and bioterrorism threats in Pakistan, there is a dire need to develop a robust and reliable health surveillance and rapid-response infrastructure with the capability to collect and analyze massive, time-evolving epidemic data in real-time. To address this challenge, we will develop a cloud-computing based distributed real-time service-oriented architecture (RTSoA) that will allow collection, communication, analysis and visualization of infectious disease epidemic data, both for natural and manmade pathogens.

The project, a multidisciplinary collaborative effort between Purdue University and many leading Pakistani institutions and hospitals, will develop a Global Real-time Infectious Disease Surveillance System (GRIDDS) employing robust and novel infectious disease epidemiology models with real-time inference and pre/exercise planning capabilities for populous regions. These capabilities are expected to play a vital role during an epidemic, when the scarce resources are allocated to different jurisdictions in a data-driven manner. Such a system will strengthen Pakistan's ability to counter weapons of mass destruction by providing officials with novel tools for situational surveillance and response.