Slashgeo

I recently rediscovered ReliefWeb, which provides maps for humanitarian emergencies and disasters. Several maps are published every day. From their about: "ReliefWeb is the world’s leading on-line gateway to information (documents and maps) on humanitarian emergencies and disasters. An independent vehicle of information, designed specifically to assist the international humanitarian community in effective delivery of emergency assistance, it provides timely, reliable and relevant information as events unfold, while emphasizing the coverage of "forgotten emergencies" at the same time." Closely related, the GeoCarta blog tells us GeoEye has formed a non-profit organization to give away satellite imagery for educational and humanitarian uses. Use Here's the press release.

Very Spatial links to AlertMap, an hungarian mashup provided by the Havaria Emergency and Disaster Information Services, which offers a mashup for many types of emergencies, ranging from biochemical, nuclear, volcanic activity, extreme weather and much more. The identification of an event is very fast with the use of GLIDE (GLobal IDEntifier number). Update: 07/05/08 01:05 GMT by S : AlertMap now uses worldkit, with GeoRSS as a new feature.

Slashdot discuss a NASA program to help predict ands prevent disease outbreaks. Their summary: "NASA and its Applied Sciences Program will be using 14 satellites to watch the Earth's environment and help predict and prevent infectious disease outbreaks around the world. Through orbiting satellites, data is collected daily to monitor environmental changes. That information is then passed on to agencies such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Department of Defense who then apply the data to predict and track disease outbreaks and assist in making public health policy decisions. The use of remote sensing technology helps scientists predict the outbreak of some of the most common and deadly infectious diseases such as Ebola, West Nile virus and Rift Valley Fever." I added below a few previous related stories.

From the ESA web site : "Thanks to the satellite, specialised doctors - although far away, either in Heraklion or even in Athens - could immediately help the teams on site. The first help provided was to understand the nature of the epidemic and treat the patients when the first symptoms were exhibited. Secondly, assistance was provided to determine the origin of the epidemic and take the necessary measures to stop the problem from spreading". See this web link for more details on a two-day training exercise conducted in the frame of the SAFE project (satellite for health early warning and for epidemiology) by the European Space Agency: http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEM7DK73R8F_index_0.html