The problem Covid-19 cases predictor solves

Given that there are limited COVID-19 testing kits, we need to rely on other diagnosis measures.

I thought to explore X-ray images as doctors frequently use X-rays and CT scans to diagnose pneumonia, lung inflammation, abscesses, and/or enlarged lymph nodes.

Since COVID-19 attacks the epithelial cells that line our respiratory tract, we can use X-rays to analyze the health of a patient’s lungs.

And given that nearly all hospitals have X-ray imaging machines, it could be possible to use X-rays to test for COVID-19 without the dedicated test kits.

Challenges we ran into

We simply don’t have enough (reliable) data to train a COVID-19 detector.

Hospitals are already overwhelmed with the number of COVID-19 cases, and given patients rights and confidentiality, it becomes even harder to assemble quality medical image datasets in a timely fashion.

I imagine in the next 12-18 months we’ll have more high quality COVID-19 image datasets; but for the time being, we can only make do with what we have.