Consortium to provide Swifter Pandemic Predictions

UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) is providing funding of £3 million will bring together leading mathematical and statistical modellers from seven UK universities to produce rigorous predictions for the COVID-19 pandemic. The ‘Joint UNIversities Pandemic and Epidemiological Research’ (JUNIPER) consortium will develop and using bespoke models to provide predictions and estimates on key questions about the COVID-19 pandemic. These results feed regularly into SPI-M, the modelling group that provides evidence to the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE) and the wider UK government.

The research groups include that of Professor Deirdre Hollingsworth of the Big Data Institute based on the Oxford University Campus. The other universities are the University of Cambridge University of Warwick, University of Exeter, University of Bristol, The University of Manchester and Lancaster University.

They will work closely with many other organisations and research teams active on COVID-19 research including the Alan Turing Institute, the Royal Statistical Society, Health Data Research UK, Public Health England, the Royal Society’s ‘RAMP’ initiative and the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences.

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