How The Largest Health Surveillance System Ever Created Is Preventing An Olympic-Size Pandemic
From a Public Health Perspective, the Olympics Can Be a Dangerous Place Athlete's at the 2009 Mexican National Olympics wear masks to protect themselves from an outbreak of swine flu. Getty ImagesHow do you tell if a flu is dangerous enough to bring down the Olympics? Map diseases in real-time, throughout the entire country Right now in London and various sites around the UK, more than half a million international travelers are sharing stories, beers, doner kebabs, close living quarters and--let's be frank--the occasional mattress. Roughly 17,000 athletes and officials from hundreds of countries are packed into the Olympic Village alone, and that doesn't take into account the spectators--more than 8 million tickets will be punched at the Games--who have piled on top of greater London's nearly 8 million inhabitants. Culturally speaking, it's a marvel that we can do this and all get well enough along. Epidemiologically speaking, it's a nightmare...