This Johns Hopkins-made map is tracking the spread of coronavirus

A coronavirus outbreak that began in Wuhan, China, is posing a global public health emergency.

One way to understand the toll is through numbers: On Sunday, officials reported that the death toll has exceeded that of the SARS outbreak of the early aughts, but there is also an uptick in recoveries, The New York Times reported.

A picture can come further into view with visualization, and Johns Hopkins’ Center for Systems Science and Engineering has taken up that task.

The Center built an online dashboard that is tracking and mapping the coronavirus around the world, according to the JHU Hub. It was built by a team led by Center cofounder and civil engineering professor Lauren Gardner. Drawing on public health data from sources in the U.S. and China, the team is updating the map as new info becomes available.

It shows that the majority of the more than 17,000 cases were reported in mainland China, with representations of which areas were most affected. It also shows that cases have spread to other countries.

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It includes data about confirmed cases, deaths and recoveries, and maps where the cases are reported and are most prevalent. Data is also available to download, which Gardner said is “critical” for researchers. The data is also being cited by media outlets.

“We built this dashboard because we think it is important for the public to have an understanding of the outbreak situation as it unfolds with transparent data sources,” Gardner told the Hub. “For the research community, this data will become more valuable as we continue to collect it over time.”

The Center is a research collective housed within JHU’s Department of Civil and Systems Engineering on the Homewood campus in North Baltimore. It is made up of faculty, researchers and students who work on interdisciplinary challenges. In the public health realm, they have in the past built predictive tools addressing diseases like measles and Zika.