Global Monitoring of the Impact of COVID-19 Pandemic through Online Surveys Sampled from the Facebook User Base

AbstractSimultaneously tracking the global COVID-19 impact across multiple populations is challenging due to regional variation in resources and reporting. Leveraging self-reported survey outcomes via an existing international social media network has the potential to provide reliable and standardized data streams to support monitoring and decision-making world-wide, in real time, and with limited local resources. The University of Maryland Global COVID Trends and Impact Survey (UMD-CTIS), in partnership with Facebook, invites daily cross-sectional samples from the social media platform’s active users to participate in the survey since launch April 23, 2020. COVID-19 indicators through December 20, 2020, from N=31,142,582 responses representing N=114 countries, weighted for nonresponse and adjusted to basic demographics, were benchmarked with government data. COVID-19-related signals showed similar concordance with reported benchmark case and test positivity. Bonferroni significance and minimal Spearman correlation strength thresholds were met in the majority. Light Gradient Boost machine learning trained on national and pooled global data verified known symptom indicators, and predicted COVID-19 trends similar to other signals. Risk mitigation behavior trends are correlated with, but sometimes lag, risk perception trends. In regions with strained health infrastructure, but active social media users, we show it is possible to define suitable COVID-19 impact trajectories. This syndromic surveillance public health tool is the largest global health survey to date, and, with brief participant engagement, can provide meaningful, timely insights into the COVID-19 pandemic and response in regions under-represented in epidemiological analyses.Significance StatementThe University of Maryland Global COVID Trends and Impact Survey (UMD-CTIS), launched April 23, 2020, is the largest remote global health monitoring system. This study includes about 30 million UMD-CTIS responses over 34 weeks (through December 2020) from N=114 countries with survey-weights to adjust for nonresponse and demographics. Using limited self-reported data, sampled daily from an international cohort of Facebook users, we demonstrate validity and utility for COVID-19 impacts trends, even in regions with scant or delayed government data. We predict COVID-19 cases in the absence of testing, and characterize perceived COVID-19 risk versus risk-lowering measures. The UMD-CTIS has the potential to support existing monitoring systems for the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as other new, as-yet-undefined global health threats.