SAIL Databank (Swansea University): against COVID-19 Hub
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SAIL Databank (Swansea University)
https://saildatabank.com/
https://popdatasci.swan.ac.uk/centres-of-excellence/sail/#
SAIL Databank is supporting the following COVID-related projects:
1.
Project: Genomics Partnership Wales (GPW)
http://www.walesgenepark.cardiff.ac.uk/genomics-partnership-wales/
In July 2017, the Genomics for Precision Medicine Strategy was launched by Vaughan Gething, Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Services, and sets out Welsh Government’s ambitious plan “to create a sustainable, internationally-competitive environment for genetics and genomics to improve health and healthcare provision for the people of Wales”.
Genomics Partnership Wales (GPW) – Partneriaeth Genomeg Cymru – has been formed to establish a united approach to genomics in Wales and represents a number of organisations across several disciplines coming together to deliver a programme of work that will enable the ambition and commitment laid out in the Genomics Strategy to be realised.
Key organisations include Welsh Government, the All Wales Medical Genetics Service, Wales Gene Park, Public Health Wales, Cardiff and Vale University Health Board, Higher Education Institutions in Wales as well as other stakeholders and collaborators.
The GPW project is part of the global project "The COVID-19 Host Genetics Initiative"
https://www.covid19hg.org/partners/
Affiliation: Cardiff University, Wales Gene Park, All Wales Medical Geneomics Service, MRC Centre for Neuropsychiatric Genetics and Genomics, SAIL databank (Swansea University) and NHS
Research question: How does variation in the human genome contribute to COVID-19 susceptibility and disease severity?
Study design: Genomics Partnership Wales, Wales Gene Park, and the All Wales Medical Genomics Service are collaborating with colleagues from Cardiff University Division of Infection and Immunity, MRC Centre for Neuropsychiatric Genetics and Genomics, and the SAIL databank (Swansea University). We will undertake genomic analysis (SNP genotyping and whole genome sequencing) of patients with severe COVID-19. The genomic data will be linked to pathogen genomes, transcriptomics, immune phenotyping and health outcome data, with the aim of contributing to national and international efforts to understand the host genomic determinants of COVID-19 susceptibility and severity.
Study Type: Prospective
Genetic analysis: WGS; GWAS
Assays planned: Viral sequencing, Transcriptomics, Immune profiling
Investigators: Andrew Fry, Julian Sampson, Sian Morgan, Ian Tully, Michaela John
2. Project: COVID-19 Symptom Study App.
Summary: The COVID-19 Symptom Study app has been developed by health science company ZOE and it is endorsed by the Welsh Government, NHS Wales, the Scottish Government and NHS Scotland. 3,723,122 participants have downloaded the app and are using it to regularly report on their health, making it the largest public science project of its kind anywhere in the world. App data is being analysed by ZOE research teams in collaboration with King's College London researchers. Other supporters include Cancer Research UK, Royal College of Surgeons of England, Royal College of General Practitioners, Age UK, Royal College of Physicians, Kidney Care UK, Action on Smoking and Health (ASH), Alzheimer's Research UK, Active Ageing, JDRF, Versus Arthritis, Diabetes UK, CART and Longevity UK.
The data from the COVID-19 Symptom Tracker app developed by ZOE is being sent to the NHS to support the response to the pandemic. Deidentified data (app data with any identifiable information removed) from the COVID-19 Symptom Study app is also arriving into Swansea University's SAIL Databank on a daily basis. Requests to access the data for research purposes can be made via the Health Data Research Innovation Gateway. To ensure that the data has maximum impact in a short timeframe, they are accelerating requests from the NHS or those with anticipated direct impact to the COVID-19 response. At the same time, this de-identified data from the COVID-19 Symptom Tracker app is being used by BREATHE – the Health Data Research Hub for Respiratory Health to inform national responses to the pandemic across the UK. This project is a collaboration between Swansea University and SAIL Databank, King’s College London, health technology company ZOE, BREATHE – the Health Data Research Hub for Respiratory Health, and is supported by Health Data Research UK.
Developed by researchers at King’s College London and ZOE, the COVID-19 monitoring app has already been downloaded by nearly 2 million ‘stay-at-home scientists’ across the UK who are using it to track their daily health and any potential coronavirus symptoms. The app is also widely being used by healthcare and hospital workers. The app acts like an early-warning radar system, providing vital information about the symptoms and spread of COVID-19. In turn, this supports the effective deployment of limited NHS resources such as healthcare personnel, testing kits or ventilators to where they are most likely to be needed.
Regular downloads of anonymised data from the app will be securely delivered through BREATHE – the Health Data Research Hub for Respiratory Health into SAIL Databank, making it accessible to NHS decision-makers and academic researchers. This also means that the app data can be linked together with other COVID-19 datasets generated by the NHS digital transformation unit, NHSX, and others.
The research teams at King’s College London are continually analysing the data to generate new insights about the disease and its progression. For example, they have discovered that loss of smell or taste are more likely to be an early symptom of COVID-19 than fever. Frequent science updates and maps showing the top-level geographical distribution of symptoms around the UK are available at covid.joinzoe.com.
At BREATHE, they have enable the ethical and safe use of the app data by other researchers and decision-making bodies to tackle the pandemic in the UK. They are doing this by: providing a place where data can be securely stored and accessed; managing the process by which people can access the data, with a fast-track process for requests from the NHS and those which may have a direct impact to the COVID-19 response; examining the data for trends and patterns, and passing this information directly to governments and emergency COVID-19 committees across the UK, keeping them up to speed on the latest information to support the management of the virus across the UK.
SAIL Databank will facilitate a secure, anonymised data pipeline to deliver information from the Covid-19 Symptom Tracking app into the NHS, supporting the response to the pandemic.
Category: Project
Name of project/reference: COVID-19 symptom tracker app
Key project contact: Zoe
Key BREATHE contact: Chris Orton
Brief description: Hosting of data for the COVID-19 Symptom tracker Developed by KCL/Zoe with >2m users and >500K regular users (SAIL databank) and convening a skilled analysis team (Aziz).
Likely resource implication: SAIL Databank, BREATHE
Notes / current state:Live
Data depositing? Yes
Data accessing? Yes
Analysis? Yes
Comments: Tracker app sub-projects underway across various institutions (universities, councils, hospitals, Government agencies etc.)
