Microsoft announced today in a company blog written by John Kahan, Chief Data Analytics Officer, Microsoft that they were mobilising their AI for Health initiative to fight COVID-19.
Microsoft is committing $20 million to advance the use of artificial intelligence and data science in fighting the COVID-19 pandemic, with a particular focus on diagnostics and hospital resources.
John Kahan, Chief Data Analytics Officer, Microsoft said in the press release: “Given the urgency, we are mobilizing our AI for Health initiative to focus on helping those on the front lines of research of COVID-19. We’re focusing our efforts in five specific areas where we think data, analysis and the skills of our data scientists can have the biggest impact. And we’re immediately dedicating $20 million to this specific effort.”
In January 2020, Microsoft announced the launch of AI for Health, an initiative to advance the health of people and communities around the world. The five-year commitment was created to empower nonprofits, researchers, and organisations with AI and data science tools.
Kahan said in the article that this was part of the larger AI for Health commitment to fighting COVID-19. The AI for Health initiative is aimed at supporting remote education and empowering students around the world, enabling businesses to work from home, securing needed medical supplies, and supporting local communities.
Microsoft said their efforts to support COVID-19-related research will focus on five key areas: data and insights, treatment and diagnostics, allocation of resources, dissemination of accurate information, and scientific research.
Their efforts to fight COVID-19 are already being backed by key partnerships across the globe with the aim to stall the progress of the Coronavirus.
These partnerships include COVID-19 High Performance Computing Consortium, The Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME), The Washington State Department of Health, Folding@home, The Sepsis Center of Research Excellence (SCORE-UW), and Take. All of which are adding their own unique capability to supporting the COVID-19 relief efforts and AI for Health initiative.
Microsoft has created a set of interactive visualisations to better help people see what progress they are making with the partnerships mentioned above in tackling and slowing the spread of Coronavirus. We suggest you check it out and you can do so by clicking here.
