Submitted
The Trinity Challenge

GOSAIC: Geospatial Platform to Predict Disease Impact

Team Leader
T.R. Price
Solution & Team Overview
Solution name:
GOSAIC: Geospatial Platform to Predict Disease Impact
Short solution summary:

Dynamic prediction of transmission pathways and disease impact on populations through geographic correlation of the environment to human health.

In what city, town, or region is your solution team based?
Salida, CO, USA
Which Challenge Area does your solution most closely address?
  • Identify (Determine & limit the disease risk pool & spill over risk), such as: Genomic data to predict emerging risk, Early warning through ecological, behavioural & other data, Intervention/Incentives to reduce risk for emergency & spill over
What specific problem are you solving?

Environmental degradation, social changes, economic hardship and disease are interrelated pathways that impact health. Environmental, social and economic data can be used in monitoring systems to predict the impact of diseases on populations. Current monitoring systems do not use all available data. Without using this data, our monitoring systems have little predictive power (pixel level) and are largely generalized to administrative units (states). 

Our monitoring systems largely rely on the social determinants of health(e.g., socio-economic, demographic, and genetic conditions). However, this data is spatially coarse, infrequently updated, and costly to measure. Frequently updated, publicly available, fine scale data on environmental determinants of health (temperature, precipitation, air quality) are available but are not extensively used in monitoring systems.

Monitoring systems that have related the environment to health have done so primarily in a single static moment and are not dynamic. Without being dynamic, the monitoring systems don't learn from the data they are monitoring and do not keep up with rates and amounts of change. Without monitoring environmental, social, and economic data and how they are changing, transmission pathways and impact of diseases to populations are unable to be accurately predicted at a fine scale.

Who does your solution serve, and what needs of theirs does it address?

According to the World Health Organization, 85 of the 102 major diseases are associated with the environment. A degraded environment disproportionately affects the most vulnerable populations, especially women and children. To ensure global health security and resilience, the environment must be incorporated into prediction models for disease impact. The information gained from GOSAIC will help government agencies, medical institutions, and supply chains (at the local to global level) to make decisions that decrease disease impact to populations. Effective environmental changes could fix at least 25% of the global disease burden. This was exemplified during the COVID-19 lockdown where a 63% reduction in NO2 over air pollution in Wuhan, China prevented an estimated 14,000 deaths.

The global community can increase their understanding of health through the non technical imagery portrayed on GOSAIC’s website. To remove language barriers and promote global accessibility, the written language used on the website is translated to the user’s language. Our global community connections (both current and future) allow us to understand the needs for GOSAIC. We expand the reach of our global community through social features (messaging, forum space), external events (hackathons) and feedback (user surveys and reviews).

What is your solution’s stage of development?
  • Proof of Concept: A venture or organisation building and testing its prototype, research, product, service, or business/policy model, and has built preliminary evidence or data
More About Your Solution
More About Your Team
Partnership & Growth Opportunities
Solution Team:
T.R. Price
T.R. Price
PhD candidate Environmental Economics, CEO Treetable LLC and Terex Maps
Sepul Barua
Sepul Barua
Dr.
Aris Persidis
Aris Persidis
Suzanne  Vernon
Suzanne Vernon
Scientific Advisor
David Yoken
David Yoken
Director Business Development
Anita Wreford
Anita Wreford
Associate Professor