2011 McHenry County Whooping Cough Outbreak Leads Boston Globe Story

McH Co Health Dept logoMcHenry County made the news in Boston Sunday.

The story was about how social media identified the whooping cough outbreak “about two weeks before local health officials issued a public statement.”

The gist of the story is that public health officials want to replicate what

a “small business called Sickweather LLC said it detected the online flare-up on Twitter and Facebook postings in early October that year.”

Federal officials at the CDC and the Department of Health and Human Services have conducted a contest to find the best social media prediction program. Results will be announced June 20th.


Comments

2011 McHenry County Whooping Cough Outbreak Leads Boston Globe Story — 2 Comments

  1. I did a lot of volunteer work, as a member of the medical reserve corps, for the county health department during the H1N1 situation.

    Unfortunately, even though the county is fully aware of outbreaks, there is a lot of legal red tape that must be removed before alerting the public.

    It takes a lot of time and effort.

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