Local newsroom staff cuts could seriously hamper disease detection

To look for early signs of disease outbreaks, disease hunters in the field of computational health informatics scour local news reports, social media posts, and search engine requests in hopes of getting ahead of contagious diseases like COVID-19. The spread of "news deserts," towns and neighborhoods not served by a local reporting staff, is a growing concern, as epidemiologists have found local reporting accurately amplifies other signals and provides deeper reservoirs of usable information than social media.