This study investigated the use of internet search patterns to track COVID-19 spread and understand disease progression across 32 countries. Analysis of symptom-specific search terms showed that increases in searches preceded reported cases and deaths by an average of 18.53 and 22.16 days, respectively. The temporal pattern of searches revealed a clear progression of symptoms, mirroring the clinical course reported in medical literature, with shortness of breath appearing approximately 5 days after initial symptoms like fever and cough. The study demonstrates the potential of real-time, population-scale internet search data as a valuable complementary resource for pandemic tracking, especially in the early stages before widespread testing.
Publisher
npj Digital Medicine
Published On
Feb 11, 2021
Authors
Tina Lu, Ben Y. Reis
Tags
COVID-19
internet search patterns
disease progression
symptom tracking
pandemic monitoring
real-time data
health research
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