Border deal for virus alert app

A local company has finally inked a deal with the Ministry of Health that will see some of up to 500 border workers (or around 10 per cent of the total) trial its Covid-19 early-warning app.

Elarm, created by Auckland company Datamine, is a smartphone app that works with biometric data collected by a “wearable” such as a Fitbit or Apple Watch.

It monitors for a slightly elevated temperature, heart palpitations, subtle changes to exercise recovery rates — all of which can be indicators that a person has coronavirus or another ailment.

Datamine founder Paul O’connor says Elarm can detect such physiological changes associated with Covid during the crucial 48 hours when a person has become infectious but has yet to feel any symptoms.

The trial will run through until early May. The app will first collect data for a baseline profile of each border worker, then look for changes.

Participation is on a voluntary basis and data collected will be private to each border worker.

But there is also the option to signup to the Elarm Guardian dashboard, which lets an employer — or in this case the Ministry of Health — view results. — NZ Herald