SBW04 Leveraging Geospatial Tools to Support Decision-Making, Increase Awareness, and Strengthen Public Health Practice with an Introduction to Google Mapping Tools

Sunday, March 20, 2016: 1:30 PM-4:00 PM
Salon C (Crystal Gateway Marriott)
Summary: This session will give an overview of how public health organizations use geospatial tools to visualize their data, and combine it with environmental data to predict disease risk and to deploy targeted interventions in a resource-scarce environment. Participants will be introduced to a variety of Google’s mapping tools and offered hands-on exercises.
Description: Geospatial tools have become increasingly important in public health decision-making, data visualization and analysis, as well as simple location referencing. When Ebola, HIV/AIDS, Malaria, or any other health-related issues are mentioned in the media, there is generally an accompanying map associated with them. Recent cases of the Zika virus, which have been classified as a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC), illustrate this. In spite of its widespread use, there remains a significant lack of public health personnel with GIS knowledge.  

This workshop will explore a variety of Google’s mapping tools and offer hands-on exercises on how to map your health data and publish that map for sharing online. This will allow participants to visualize and analyze their data from a new perspective and highlight the issues they are investigating. They will learn how maps can be powerful tools for their work. 

This workshop is intended as an introduction. Its goal is to inspire participants to learn more about using Google Maps as well as other geospatial tools such as ArcGIS and QGIS. We will present a brief survey of Google’s mapping tools and dive into a hands-on training using Fusion Tables and Earth Engine, our robust environmental data library and analysis engine. 

Please sign up for Earth Engine in advance at: earthengine.google.com/signup.

A LAPTOP IS STRONGLY RECOMMENDED FOR WORKSHOP PARTICIPANTS.

Presenters/Panelists:
Allison Lieber, Program Manager, Google, Inc. , Gina M. Sarfaty, MA Ed, MS, Geospatial Specialist, USAID and Edward P. Vallejo, MPH, CPH, Public Health Analyst, US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
Moderator:
Edward P. Vallejo, MPH, CPH, Public Health Analyst, US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention