Would you like to help the scientific community improve their (and our) understanding of the transmission and impact of COVID-19? There are easy (and anonymous) ways to do that by answering a few simple questions about how you feel each day and adding your information to that of thousands of others. The broader the participation in these crowd-sourcing data activities, the better our understanding of the incidence and prevalence of COVID-19 in our local communities and in the general population:

information that is vital to understanding risks of infection, allocation of health resources, and rational governmental decisions on the duration of protective measures.

No personal identifying information is collected or retained. The more people who participate in these “crowd-sourcing” efforts, the better our understanding of COVID transmission.

Here are a couple I use; both are from reputable sources and both provide interesting displays of the prevalence of the disease in our communities.

“How We Feel”, a collaboration of the Harvard Chan School of Public Health, the Gates Foundation, Feeding America, and others, relies on a downloadable app which you use to daily answer a few easy questions about how you feel and whether you have had certain symptoms or contacts. It takes about two minutes and, if you wish, they will remind you each day that it is time for a new report.

“COVID Near You” (from researchers at Harvard and Boston Children’s Hospital) is an online report that starts by asking: “How are you feeling?” You choose between two responses, “Great, thanks!” and “Not feeling well.” And then answer a few other questions, e.g., “Did you have a flu shot?”

There are others. (I believe Facebook has or is planning their own. But, don’t they already have enough of your information?) Why there isn’t a single collection that would increase the research value seems regrettable, but is understandable, as they each take slightly different approaches.

Still needed, of course, are widespread contact tracing, throat swabs, and serological testing.

And there is an additional personal benefit: If your friends and family are tired of hearing you tell them how you feel, these researchers and epidemiologists are quite happy to hear how you feel – day-in and day-out.

Bob Raymond

La Conner