Miraculously, even before we were told to stay home for just “15 Days to Slow the Spread," an app using Google Cloud had already been created and sent to every public school in the US for detection and monitoring of Covid.…On May 13, 2020, MTX received a two year, $295 million “contact tracing” contract from state of Texas. Granted, the $295 million was federal taxpayer dollars, but why did Texas decide or agree that Covid would be in the US for at least 2 years?
“The Frisco [Texas]-based MTX Group Inc. is donating its newly launched disease-monitoring and control application to all public school districts in the U.S….
Co-founder Nipa Nobel said the app, which has a value of $500,000, is designed for use by state government agencies, airports and health officials….
Only New York is using the app so far, but Nobel said the company is discussing its benefits with D/FW Airport and other states, including California, Indiana and Oklahoma.
“MTX is collaborating with the New York State Department of Health in deploying a coronavirus-monitoring and messaging system that enabled New York state to not only monitor travelers, but also physicians and people that come [in] close contact with anyone with symptoms,” Nobel wrote via email.
Users who are arriving from affected global regions are asked to check in through a process called a “digital quarantine,” which will track the development of their symptoms.
“Once we have contacts or travelers in the system, the app seeks consent and then sends daily text messages asking individuals if they have any illness or symptoms,” Nobel wrote. “This continues for 14 days and all conversations are tracked and help [the New York State Department of Health] better assist an individual in need of medical care.”
The data is sent to health officials in real time so they can identify the most at-risk individuals and provide immediate clinical attention to them to prevent the spread to others.It will also monitor individuals who have been in close contact with confirmed cases and physicians and health care officials who have worked work with suspected patients.
Through Google Cloud, the application also uses the real-time data to predict at-risk communities and disease growth rates and monitor all rapidly spreading diseases. Additionally, MTX artificial intelligence predicts movement of the outbreak and advises users how to mobilize their resources.
The application’s real-time heat map shows the scale and movement of the outbreak as an attempt to prevent patients from infecting others, according to the Facebook page. Nobel confirmed that this could be used at the local level to monitor large events, like South by Southwest, which was canceled last week due to the virus.
“The great thing about this app is that it can be used for any future outbreaks and collect actionable insights,” Nobel wrote.”
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Added: On May 13, 2020, MTX received a two year, $295 million “contact tracing” contract from state of Texas:
May 20, 2020, “Small Frisco [Texas] company wins huge Texas COVID-19 contract. Lawmakers question if it’s up to the $295M job,“ Dallas News, Robert T. Garrett, Allie Morris
“A little-known Frisco [Texas] company…has won a $295.3 million state contract [entirely paid for with federal dollars] to track down Texans potentially infected with the coronavirus….
MTX Group Inc. won the 27-month contract in a whirlwind bidding process, beating out 10 mostly big-name corporations, such as IBM, AT&T Global Business Services and Accenture LLP….
The push, entirely paid for with federal dollars, aims to detect who has been exposed to people infected with the virus; monitor such people for symptoms; and instruct them how to get tested and where….
While the [MTX] company’s proposal offered an option for “proximity-based contact tracing” through Google and Apple, the state declined, Van Deusen said….
Many legislators feel they should have received advance notice that so large a contract was being awarded so fast, said [Sen.] Bettencourt, a member of the budget-writing Finance Committee. But they were not notified before the contract was signed May 13, just 16 days after Gov. Greg Abbott announced the contact tracing effort….
The agreement allows MTX Group to collect $34.50 an hour for contact tracers, and $35.65 an hour for case investigators. That doesn’t mean the company’s paying workers at anywhere near those hourly rates, though….
It has built an app that allows people to enter their symptoms and receive guidance on whether to be tested….
Over four years, MTX grew from roughly three employees to a $10 million company with a 200-person workforce, according to a 2019 article in the legal trade publication Vanguard. Roughly 150 of the company’s employees are based in India, the article said. A majority of the businesses’ customers are public entities, it said. But whether the client is government or for-profit, MTX Group’s forte has been integrating a sales-tracking tool into their existing IT systems or customizing the software. In Kentucky, that involved using SalesForce to track liquor licensees.”…
Image, 3/20/20, Trump and Fauci at press conference with sign, “15 days to slow the spread,” getty.
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