Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University will be working to forecast the spread of covid-19, the university announced Monday.
The Delphi Research Group, one of two Influenza Forecasting Centers of Excellence designated last year by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, typically does most of its work forecasting the flu during the fall and winter months.
This year, the group will continue forecasting into the summer, using the same methods it uses to observe the flu to track the spread of covid-19.
Those methods include using statistical machine learning to make predictions based on previous patterns, as well as a “wisdom of the crowd” method that bases predictions on responses from human volunteers.
“The wisdom of the crowds method might be useful for this novel coronavirus, given that it’s based on the collective wisdom of people, who are good at adapting to previously unseen circumstances,” said Roni Rosenfeld, leader of the Delphi group and head of CMU’s Machine Learning Department.
Given the limited data, it will be difficult to determine the accuracy of these forecasts or to draw any conclusions from a single season of forecasting covid-19, Rosenfeld said.
“It will be difficult to know whether your forecasting method is reliable,” Rosenfeld said. “Because after this season is over, we will know whether the forecast was accurate or not, but we will not know if we were lucky or unlucky. You could be accurate because of luck, you could be inaccurate because of bad luck. You cannot draw many conclusions from a single season.”
There were 10 presumed positive cases of covid-19 in Pennsylvania as of Monday afternoon, according to a statement from the Pennsylvania Department of Health.
Seven of those cases are in Montgomery County, along with one in Delaware County, one in Monroe County and one in Wayne County.
There were no reported cases of covid-19 in Allegheny County as of Monday afternoon.
Experts overseeing covid-19 preparations in the UPMC health system said Monday morning that there are no confirmed covid-19 cases at any UPMC facilities, but UPMC has sent specimens to state labs for testing.
The health system is still working to develop its own covid-19 tests.
Keeping with protocols followed during flu season, which typically runs from fall to spring, Dr. David A. Nace, chief medical officer for UPMC Senior Communities, urged visitors to UPMC senior facilities to stay home if they are sick and to put off visiting friends and family until they are healthy.
“I’d like to ask the public not to visit their loved ones in person in a long-term care facility or in a skilled nursing facility if they are ill or if they have cold symptoms, even relatively minor ones,” Nace said. “This will help us avoid accidentally spreading not only covid-19, but many of the common respiratory viruses that are circulating in our communities into our vulnerable elderly population.”
