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“The data in the app can give us a better idea of the course of the disease and why some are only mildly affected while others become seriously ill and die,” says Paul Franks, professor of genetic epidemiology at Lund University.
According to a press release, it should take about a minute a day to answer simple questions about your health in the app. This is believed to help reduce the spread of covid-19.
The application is expected to discover:
• In which parts of the country the risk of infection is high.
• What factors increase the risk of becoming seriously ill and how the risk is affected by the underlying diseases.
• The spread of the virus in different parts of the country.
The Public Health Authority has not yet heard from me.
According to Paul Franks, the Rector of Lund University has had a dialogue with Johan Carlson, Director General of the Public Health Authority.
“The public health authority has received a description of our application,” he says.
But haven’t they given you a reaction?
“They haven’t heard from me yet. But I have no expectations as to whether they should support this or not. Of course, it would help if they did.”
A version of the app is already in use in the UK and the United States, and soon in India as well.
It was originally developed by doctors and researchers at Kings College London and Guys and St Thomas Hospitals in collaboration with Zoe Global, a company that analyzes health data, it is called.
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The ambition is to get the public to quickly report their symptoms and, therefore, provide a comprehensive overview of the state of health in the country.
“So far in Sweden so few viruses are being tested, it is difficult to get an idea of how widespread the infection is,” says Paul Franks.
Thanks to an ongoing research collaboration, researchers at the University of Lund also had the opportunity to quickly adapt the app for use in Sweden.
However, it remains to be seen which path the Public Health Authority chooses when it comes to collecting such covid-19 data. This week, the Swedish Social Protection and Preparedness Agency, MSB, announced that it is pausing work with a digital tool to identify symptoms and behavioral changes in the population.
MSB has developed its tool in collaboration with the Public Health Authority. But now the Public Health Authority has requested that MSB wait to move forward, as regions are hesitant about the tool today, as it could increase anxiety and pressure from the health system.
The information collected in the Lund University crown app gives insight into the symptoms associated with covid-19. In the past, fever, cough, and breathing difficulties have been identified as clear signs of the disease.
“But data collected with the app in other countries shows that headaches, muscle aches, and decreased sense of smell and taste, as well as diarrhea, can also be symptoms of the infection,” said María Gómez, Physiology teacher, who, along with Paul Franks, has been a driving force in working with to launch the app in Sweden.
They emphasize that the application does not diagnose. The app does not offer health advice and you cannot contact health professionals through the app.
It also does not collect information on participant names, social security numbers, addresses or phone numbers. The user specifies their ZIP code as their geographic residence, but only the first two digits of ZIP codes are used in compilations of regional infections, it is called.
Furthermore, the app does not collect any GPS data and cannot in any way track the movement patterns of participants or people they know according to the EU Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).
The researchers urge as many people as possible to use the app daily until the pandemic ends.
“All you have to do is report things related to your symptoms and your situation. If you are healthy, we also want to know. The more people use the application, the better, “says María Gómez.
