Open Source COVID-19 Text line
With the increasing spread of the COVIOD-19 virus, information is key to reduce panic and let people have more access to data. As a result, the open-source coivd-helpline came to exist.
+1 (914) COVID-99
The goal is to raise awareness and facilitate communication about Coronavirus cases by making the latest updated open source COVID-19 data cases available to everyone offline through their texts.
During pandemics, communication is critical. It is reasonable, cheap, and easy to make case data information, the latest Coronavirus news, and the CDC advice about how to stay safe accessible via text at +1 (914)268-4399.
WHY IT MATTERS
The biggest issue with pandemics is communication. According to a 2019 study, 10% of the U.S population does not use the internet. 42% of older adults are part of that group. The vast majority of Americans — 96% — now own a cellphone of some kind. Of that 96% of Americans, only 81% own a smartphone. We also have 91% of Americans age 65+, who own some type of cellphone, of that share 39% of the group do not own a smartphone. Still, these numbers are more extreme in developing countries.
These statistics are extremely important. People at higher risk of contracting COVID-19 are older adults and people who have severe chronic medical conditions like heart, lung or kidney disease. According to early CDC data, it is suggested that older people are twice as likely to have serious COVID-19 illness.
How it works
To provide COVID-19 cases data, we are currently using the open source dataset provided by John Hopkins University-Corona Virus Resource Center through their open source database which is updated daily with the new reported cases worldwide.We provide tips and recommendations directly from the CDC website. Our offline news capabilities over the Corona Virus is powered by News API.
Using our service you can find information about cases in locations around the world. For example:
Current Implementation
We are currently using Twillio as our sms provider and Google Cloud for hosting our servers. The workflow is as follows.
We currently use Python to handle the sms logic. We decided to use Flask for our backend framework so it is easy for new developer to contribute to it and serve more information.
Costs
Our current costs are broken down as follows:
Currently each text inbound and outbound costs us $0.0075 in the U.S. because we are using their API according to their current pricing.
Each $1 donation allows for 65 texts.
Further costs include hosting, and we are currently using a n1-standard-1 type in GCP which costs $24.2725/month according to the current pricing.
Contributing
The core of this project is to be open-source, to provide reliable data and to be transparent so I encourage you contribute to the Github repository! If you have ideas how to reduce costs better feature don’t hesitate to reach out!