Swiss app tracks illnesses while travelling

University of Zurich app tracks illnesses while travelling Keystone-SDA

Someone falls ill on every third trip, with gastrointestinal complaints and respiratory symptoms being the most common problems, according to a study evaluating a travel app developed at the University of Zurich (UZH).

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The app should help to detect outbreaks of infectious diseases at an early stage, the UZH announced on Tuesday. It could thus help to track the emergence and spread of infectious diseases such as dengue fever and mpox.

UZH researchers developed the app in collaboration with the World Health Organization (WHO). In the app, people answer a few questions about their health every day while travelling, the university wrote. The app also records information such as location, weather data and air quality.

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The research team analysed data between April 2022 and July 2023, covering 470 trips by 609 people on all continents. Almost a fifth of the cases of illness were due to gastrointestinal complaints. Asia is the hotspot for this. This was less of a problem in Africa.

Overall, more women reported diseases involving diarrhoea than men. Some 17% of cases of illness were respiratory diseases such as colds, according to the UZH. These occurred most frequently in Europe.

Translated from German by DeepL/ts

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