National Library of Medicine proposes blockchain for Covid data

The world is still fighting the coronavirus, but on a smaller scale than when the number of global cases was at its peak. The Covid-19 data has become so large that it is becoming difficult to store and use it effectively. The United States National Library of Medicine (NLM), the world’s largest medical library, recently came up with a proposal to solve this problem using blockchain.

A blockchain for EHRs

According to the document titled ‘A Global Blockchain for Recording High Incidence of COVID-19 Vaccinations’ released on May 30, 2023. The paper proposes a blockchain-based vaccination management system, GEOS. The idea is to solve problems related to the global campaign against the disease.

The document discusses how global availability of electronic health records (EHR) can be valuable for everyone. The technology can help keep an eye on progress in the vaccination process, detect infection and more. Covid remains active globally with many regions witnessing hospitalization cases.

The proposed system consists of a pair of layers – National Immunization Blockchain (NIB) and Global Immunization Blockchain (GIB). The former will stack the data, as the name suggests, at the national level, while the latter is used for global interoperability and aggregation of statistics.

EHR records have previously been misused in breaches of privacy. Such cases can lead to problems including limited vaccine availability for vulnerable or marginalized populations, uncertain delays in treating an individual and more, the paper highlighted.

The technology has the potential to change several markets

Data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) show that 56 million have received the booster dose in the United States. To this day, the nation has the highest death toll with 1.1 million killed by the disease. According to the CDC, new SARS-Cov-2 variants are expected to emerge. Some of them will stay and spread while others will disappear.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), the virus affected 767 million people worldwide; The United States was worst affected with 103 million cases. Furthermore, the Western Pacific region saw the highest number of cases in a single day – 42.8 million on December 19, 2022. Nearly 7 million people died globally due to the deadly pandemic, data shows.

Companies including Novavax, Moderna, Johnson and Johnson are actively involved in this fight against the coronavirus. Novavax was awarded the largest covid-19 contract in June 2020. Similarly, Moderna saw a significant increase in mRNA-1273 vaccine during the pandemic.

Blockchain can revolutionize every industry it is employed in. According to a survey conducted by Deloitte, a professional services network, 81% of respondents said the technology is largely scalable. 80% believe their respective industries will experience new revenue streams through it.

According to Grand View Research, the blockchain market generated $10.02 billion last year and is projected to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of nearly 87% between 2023 to 2030. Crypto payments are a major driver of the technology’s adoption. Starbucks, KFC, Twitch are some of the big companies that accept crypto payments. Microsoft started accepting Bitcoin as a payment method in Xbox, Windows and other platforms

Bill Gates, Microsoft’s co-founder, once said that “Bitcoin is better than currency.”

Anurag has been working as a founding writer for The Coin Republic since 2021. He enjoys exercising his curiosity muscles and researching deeply into a topic. Although he covers various aspects of the crypto industry, he is quite passionate about Web3, NFTs, Gaming and Metaverse, envisioning them as the future of the (digital) economy. A reader and writer at heart, he calls himself an “average guitar player” and a fun soccer player.