How is Artificial Intelligence helping India win against a virus?
In just under a year, India has gone from “Oh my God, Coronavirus” to “Oh my God, Lockdown” and finally to “Wow, Vaccine”. As we commence the 2nd phase of the vaccination drive with two “Made in India” vaccines, the fear experienced when the first positive patient was found about a year back has all but vanished.
The R&D capabilities of the Indian pharmaceutical community started becoming apparent as the cases grew with every passing day. Today, India is not only vaccinating its own citizens but is also supporting a lot of countries across the world with its “Made in India” jabs!
While for us ordinary citizens the pandemic management process may sound very simple, but behind the screen, there is a lot of hard work and technology, specifically Artificial Intelligence (AI), at play.
In fact, India has been rated as the world’s biggest adopter of AI technologies across industries. According to a study conducted by PWC, India tops the chart of AI adopters and has even left behind some of the developed nations.
Surprisingly, the corporate sector is not the only one that is welcoming AI with open arms, it is also the Government of India that is using AI for implementing what is being dubbed as the “World’s Largest Vaccination Programme”!
AI has been deployed by the Central and State Governments in their fight against the pandemic in multiple ways. Let us see some instances where AI is being used effectively.
1. Arogya Setu App
This App was one of the first AI-powered tools to be released by the Government. While the App serves multiple objectives, its primary objective was contact tracing. Through the location history of the smartphone and the Bluetooth facility, the app was designed to trace the exact whereabouts of a patient and to identify the people who came in contact with this person. Additionally, the app provides information like the dally tally of patients, number of patients in your close vicinity and even acts as a reliable information dissemination tool. Designed to operate in 12 Indian languages, the app currently has a database of over 10 million users and growing. Similar apps’ were also developed by the IISc, Bangalore (GoCOronaGo), and IITs (Sampark-O-Meter). Managing such a large database would not have been possible without an effective deployment of AI.
2. MyGov Saathi Chatbot.
To develop reliable, accurate, and latest useful information on pandemic management, the Government introduced MyGov Saathi Chatbot in collaboration with Accenture and Microsoft. The tool is equipped to handle over 300,000 conversations per day and over 20,000 users per minute logged in at instance! The chatbot is capable of disseminating all kinds of pandemic information like fact sheets, information on various initiatives, medical and other professional help, managing alerts, and above all acting as a myth-buster by answering all user queries about virus like its transmission, prevention, and recuperation.
3. X-Ray Diagnosis
Across the world, Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) test is used to diagnose Covid-19. Unfortunately, the PCR test is not only time-consuming but is also costly. X-rays have now emerged as one of the most reliable methods of Covid-19 diagnosis. But the chances of inaccurate diagnosis due to human error rise drastically if X-rays are to be studied manually on a mass scale. Companies like Qure.ai and TCS have developed AI-powered tools that not only study such X-rays on a mass scale but can also diagnose the patient’s Covid-19 status. The AI tool studies the extent of lung infection visible in the X-ray identifies the Ground Glass Opacities in the lungs and arrives at a reliable conclusion on the patient’s status.
4. Mask Violator Identification
The adage “Protection is better than cure” holds in the case of Covid-19 too. Wearing a mask to cover the nose & mouth is still regarded as one of the most crucial steps in preventing the transmission of Covid-19. States like Telangana are using AI-powered CCTV cameras to identify non-mask wearers. From a sea of people, the AI software identifies the violators and sends a notification to the Police Head Quarters which in turn alerts the police teams nearby. The entire process happens on a real-time basis. The technology is currently being tested in Hyderabad, Cyberabad, and Rachakonda.
5. Treatment
For patients undergoing treatment, the Indraprastha Institute of Information Technology has devised an AI-powered tool that helps in repurposing the medicines for patients. Instead of manually arriving at the best possible combination of medicines, the tool studies the symptoms, analyses the past patient’s database and then suggests the precise combination of medicines. Even TCS has developed a similar tool that not only helps in cutting down on time but also arrives at the precise mix of medicines for the patients. States like Chhatisgarh have gone a step further. It is using AI-powered tools to provide tele-medicine, tele-consultation with experts for not only Covid-19 but for other diseases too!
It is a fact that the Coronavirus caught the world napping, but AI made its grand appearance just in time. Besides being used in R & D by vaccine makers, AI has found immense application in the prevention and management of the Covid-19 pandemic.
While the development of the Covid-19 vaccine took slightly less than a year, we shouldn’t be surprised if a vaccine is developed in just 3 to 6 months the next time with the help of our newfound ally Artificial Intelligence.
