ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the growth of Internet surveillance response programs (ISRPs) that have increasingly mapped and reported disease outbreaks around the world. More than 60% of World Health Organization's Alert and Response Operations first outbreak reports come from “unofficial informal sources,” which includes electronic media, discussion sites, and social media. The proliferation of social media has led many ISRPs to rely primarily upon “ontology software” for text mining and language translation to detect early reports or “rumours” of novel disease outbreaks. ISRPs’ search functionality relies primarily on local reporting of disease events. The process for HealthMap, MedISys, and Global Public Health Intelligence Network (GPHIN) involves text mining technology and access to large news aggregation sites such as FACTIVA. Human moderation steps in at various points to filter reports: GPHIN almost from the beginning, HealthMap in the middle, and Biocaster and MedISys literally prior to posting.
