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SISS-Geo: Leveraging Citizen Science to Monitor Wildlife Health Risks in Brazil

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Abstract

The well-being of human and wildlife health involves many challenges, such as monitoring the movement of pathogens; expanding health surveillance; collecting data and extracting information to identify and predict risks; integrating specialists from different areas to handle data, species and distinct social and environmental contexts; and the commitment to bringing relevant information to society. In Brazil, there is still the difficulty of building a system that is not impaired by its large territorial extension and its poorly integrated sectoral policies. The Brazilian Wildlife Health Information System, SISS-Geo (SISS-Geo is the abbreviation of “Sistema de Informação em Saúde Silvestre Georreferenciado” (which translates to “Georeferenced Wildlife Health Information System”) and can be accessed at http://www.biodiversidade.ciss.fiocruz.br or http://sissgeo.lncc.br (in Portuguese)), is a platform for collaborative monitoring that intends to overcome the challenges in wildlife health. It aims at the integration and participation of various segments of society, encompassing the registration of animals occurrences by citizen scientists; the reliable diagnosis of pathogens from the laboratory and expert networks; and computational and mathematical challenges in analytical and predictive systems, model interpretation, data integration and visualization, and geographic information systems. It has been successfully applied to support decision-making on recent wildlife health events, such as a Yellow Fever epizootic.

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Notes

  1. http://www.tdwg.org

  2. http://mapbiomas.org

  3. https://pmm.nasa.gov/data-access/downloads/gpm

  4. http://www.worldclim.org

  5. https://www.ibge.gov.br

  6. http://sedac.ciesin.columbia.edu

  7. https://asterweb.jpl.nasa.gov/gdem.asp

  8. http://morcego.siss.lncc.br/i3geo/interface/black_ol.htm

  9. After all, it is an ambitious system that aims to aggregate and store records on wildlife health of a vast country.

  10. Consider the extreme situation where all the predictions are non-alerts, including both true as false negatives. Since, in principle, only the cases of alerts are of interest and subject to confirmation, in this scenario, the model would be doomed to degeneration.

  11. http://www.mma.gov.br/component/k2/item/10443-pr& (In Portuguese)

  12. http://dspace.jbrj.gov.br/jspui/handle/doc/95

  13. http://www.oie.int/wahis_2/public/wahid.php/Wahidhome/Home

  14. http://www.agricultura.gov.br/assuntos/sanidade-animal-e-vegetal/animal-animal/epidemiologia/ingles/animal-health-information-system

  15. http://www.funbio.org.br/probioii

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Funding

This work is funded by the Global Environment Facility (GEF) among World Bank, Caixa Econômica Federal, Brazilian Biodiversity Fund (Funbio), and Fiocruz for the development of the “National Biodiversity Mainstreaming and Institutional Consolidation Project” coordinated by the Brazilian Ministry of the Environment.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Oswaldo Cruz Foundation, Biodiversity, Wildlife Health Institutional Platform (PIBSS/Fiocruz), Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

    Marcia Chame, Douglas A. Augusto, Eduardo Krempser & Livia Abdalla

  2. National Laboratory for Scientific Computing, Petrópolis, Brazil

    Helio J. C. Barbosa & Luiz M. R. Gadelha Jr.

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  1. Marcia Chame
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  2. Helio J. C. Barbosa
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  3. Luiz M. R. Gadelha Jr.
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Correspondence to Luiz M. R. Gadelha Jr..

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Web interface: http://sissgeo.lncc.br and http://www.biodiversidade.ciss.fiocruz.br Geographical explorer: http://morcego.siss.lncc.br/i3geo/interface/black_ol.htm Mobile application (Android): https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=siss.ui Mobile application (iOS): https://itunes.apple.com/br/app/siss-geo/id1291912325

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Chame, M., Barbosa, H.J.C., Gadelha, L.M.R. et al. SISS-Geo: Leveraging Citizen Science to Monitor Wildlife Health Risks in Brazil. J Healthc Inform Res 3, 414–440 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s41666-019-00055-2

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