Montreal-based artificial intelligence institute launches COVID-19 tracing app

#Montreal; #Covid19TracingApp; #MILA; #AIResearchInstitute; #COVI

Montreal (Quebec), May 18 (Canadian-Media): A tracking app COVI designed to protect people from COVID-19 and limit its spread has been launched by Montreal-based artificial intelligence (AI) research institute MILA, media reports said.
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​The app COVI has the potential to identify people, similar to contact tracing, who’ve been exposed to COVID-19, MILA president Valrie Pisano said.

COVI Canada, an independent not-for-profit with sole mission to support Canadians in their fight against Covid-19 brings together a coalition of of over 500 Canadian researchers and experts, combining research from public health, epidemiology, privacy, machine learning (ML), ethics and psychology.

With the aim to collect information from different people through a network. COVI aims to help calculate one’s probability of catching the virus. 

COVI app Image credit: mila.quebec

Montreal-based AI institute ready to roll out contact-tracing phone application /via @globeandmail https://t.co/LpyYjvQYA5

— Valerie Pisano (@vpisano_mila) May 16, 2020

It is believed by the institute that the app will be authentic to lift social distancing measures. 

The institute is in talks with governments at multiple levels, including the federal government, to permit the usage of the app over the next few weeks, said Pisano. 

On Friday Mylène Drouin, Montreal’s public health director said that her team has been preparing to study apps that can trace COVID-19.

Pisano said MILA’s proposed app is one of them. 

Montreal leads Canada both in terms of the number of COVID-19-related deaths and the number of confirmed cases.

A word from Yoshua Bengio, Mila Scientific Director and COVI lead