As Corona virus is spreading heavily in China and across the globe, hospitals are overcrowded and brave doctors are fighting round the clock to contain this pandemic.

In China, a smart computer vision system that reads images and diagnoses corona virus has been developed that can give accurate corona virus predictions within seconds rather than blood tests that could take hours.

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Faster than doctors?

Ping An Smart healthcare (an Artificial intelligence start up) has come up with a systems that is helping doctors to contain this epidemic using Artificial intelligence.

This tool can find a corona virus disease from CT scan images in less than 15 seconds with 90% accuracy. Doctors currently take 15 minutes to do the same.

"Comparing multiple images is a time-consuming task and it cannot be accurately completed manually,” Xiao Jing, PhD, chief scientist

AI to combat CoronaVirus

As COVID-19 is a new disease, medical institutions, especially at the primary level in China, lack diagnosis experience. The Nucleic Acid Test (NAT) had been regarded as the major reference for COVID-19 diagnoses. But as the epidemic continues to spread, the NAT has had several problems, including long detection times and a high proportion of false negative cases. This resulted in some patients missing the chance for early treatment or quarantine.

"Since its launch, the smart image-reading system has helped more than 1,500 medical institutions. More than 5,000 patients have received smart image-reading services for free. The system can generate smart analysis results in around 15 seconds, with an accuracy rate above 90%", said Geoff Kau, Co-President and Chief Strategy Officer of Ping An Smart City.

More than 84,000 cases of coronavirus have now been confirmed across the globe, with the death toll quickly approach 3,000. Radiologists at Mount Sinai in New York were the first in the U.S. to analyze CT scans from COVID-19 patients, revealing their findings earlier this month in Radiology.

Researchers have released numerous studies since, exploring infection control measures, the imaging physicians’ role in controlling the outbreak beyond making the initial diagnosis, and steps interventional radiologists can take to prepare.