COVID-19 Dashboard
If you were one of those who was ignorant or had little knowledge of how geospatial information can be relevant to our lives - now you know more. The COVID-19 crisis has just broadened our understanding of this powerful and relevant technological tool that is widely used around the world.
I would imagine that many of us have already visited the COVID-19 Dashboard at least twice since the Permanent Secretary for Health and Medical Services Dr James Fong launched it in his COVID-19 update on Monday.
This Geospatial Information System (GIS) as Dr Fong said would greatly assist his team in organising information collected from the ground and presented in a map that could be understood by his team and those on the ground.
If you’ve visited the site, perhaps your first instinct was to visit the locality you live in and count the red dots which represent the number of COVID-19 cases or if you were lucky, count none.
What is key in this technological data is that it will help us, whether you’re in Government, on the frontline, in business, in your community, or just a citizen who wants to be informed, that it will assist in our COVID-19 response.
Having it available to the general public will help people to make evidence-based decisions and the more reason to follow the COVID-safe protocols.
In launching the COVID-19 Dashboard Dr Fong said: “As long as users have an internet connection, they can navigate on the map to view the case spread at various locations across the country.
“It is anticipated that this dashboard will provide members of the public situational awareness of where the active cases are, and follow the relevant safety guidelines put in place by my
Ministry to protect themselves and their families.”
It will help us to understand that in order to decrease our infection rate, we must stay home, travel only for essential purposes and as Dr Fong highlighted in one of his many speeches ‘don’t muck around’.
It will help us become resilient, adapting to change easily, and being alert so that we are safe from this invisible enemy.
And while this resource is accessible to anyone with internet data, we must also remember to treat it with utmost integrity.
I’m referring to how we use it in a public space, particularly social media.
We see the red dots become dense in particular locations within the Lami-Nausori Containment Area. There are many reasons for that.
But one thing that should be clear is - if we are responsible people we must refrain from stigmatizing households and individuals in these locations.
They are already in dire straits. Infected breadwinners and their families do not need to be scrutinised or publicly shamed. Like our frontliners fighting this war, they need your support. So use this tool for public good, not for public damage.
RANOBA BAOA