A team of researchers at New York University, Johns Hopkins, and the University of California, Davis have published a paper in PLOS ONE arguing that the United States has become a leader in developing and deploying health systems that prevent and manage the spread of infectious diseases, but that a new class of systems is needed to address this growing threat.
The paper, which was co-authored by researchers from NYU’s Department of Computer Science, and at least one of the other teams that made the study, argues that this new class is necessary to combat the growing threat of pandemic coronavirus (COVID-19).
COVID-17 has claimed over 4,000 lives in the US, and more than 6,000 in other parts of the world, making it the most deadly pandemic in recorded history.
The new class includes a new type of system called the encomiendas system, which is based on the concept of “communal health networks” (CHNs), which involve small groups of individuals with common needs in order to effectively coordinate, manage, and provide services.
The system, known as an encomia system, has been proven to be a valuable tool in many settings in the healthcare sector, including healthcare delivery and prevention, among other roles.
“The encomias system is a novel system of community health networks that has been developed and validated to address the increasing pandemic pandemic threat,” the paper says.
“It’s based on a theory of community, but it’s not based on any of the concepts that have been widely used in the biomedical sciences to describe health systems.”
It further notes that while encomiya systems are an important component of health systems across the globe, they have only recently been able to be adopted into the healthcare arena, and that the system has only been demonstrated to work in a small subset of cases.
The current encomiyes system, however, is capable of handling the epidemic pandemic and its associated pandemic strain, which includes coronaviruses.
“Encomiya is not a system for the prevention of coronaviral disease,” the researchers write, and instead it is a system that can “facilitate effective coordination and coordination of community-based activities, including providing healthcare, healthcare coordination, and health promotion services.”
“While there are a number of examples in the literature that are showing the effectiveness of community engagement for preventing coronavurism, including efforts by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to implement an enComia model, these efforts have generally been limited in their ability to prevent coronavireptid and other coronavirosts from spreading within the community.”
The authors of the paper conclude by noting that there is a need for a new system that is able to address COVID epidemics.
They suggest that this should be done by the introduction of a new generation of encomie systems that include more robust, effective community engagement.
The work is a follow-up to a 2015 study, published in PLO’s journal PLoS Medicine, that examined the use of enComiendas systems as an alternative to traditional healthcare delivery systems.
“Community engagement and health management are not just an issue of preventing and treating disease.
They are also the tools that are critical to providing community-wide care, including access to care, and preventing and controlling communicable diseases,” the authors write.
“These encomiae are a powerful and practical tool for addressing the emerging COVID epidemic in the United United States.”
The team has previously published a series of papers examining the effectiveness and cost effectiveness of a number other new health systems in developing COVIDs.
The authors are now hoping to find funding for their next paper, in order for it to be published.
For more on COVID, check out this Forbes article.