Can smartphone apps track COVID-19 without violating your privacy?
Contact tracing apps could help prevent second and third waves of the coronavirus once social distancing rules loosen up across the country. (Pexels/)In California, early signs have begun to appear that the state’s swift and aggressive social distancing measures have slowed the spread of COVID-19. Now, the city of San Francisco is assembling a task force to prevent the disease from surging back once they relax stay-at-home orders. They plan to do so by tracking down everyone who has come into contact with those who test positive for COVID-19.This technique, known as contact tracing, will be necessary across the United States to tamp down transmission levels until a vaccine comes along; a similar effort is already ramping up in Massachusetts. However, traditional contact tracing is time and labor-intensive, and will be difficult for public health officials to enact on the scale needed across the country. It also depends on people’s...