Group photo of Huang's team. [Photo provided to chinadaily.com.cn]

Q: So far, how has the system helped with outbreak containment?

Huang: The goal of the prediction system is to use scientific methods to predict pandemic development and provide the government with a scientific basis for assessing the epidemic situation and adopting effective control measures.

Q: Compared with other prediction systems worldwide, what's special about yours? Does any exchange and communications with your peer scientists worldwide improve accuracy?

Huang: Our prediction system is an innovation that combines approaches from fields such as atmospheric sciences and epidemiology to continuously make daily, monthly and seasonal global predictions from the early stage of the global pandemic.

We also share our predictions with the WHO and experts in relevant fields worldwide.

Q: What areas of expertise are on the team?

Huang: The prediction team includes experts and staff specializing in atmospheric sciences, public health, applied statistics and artificial intelligence.

The establishment of the system was fully supported by the School of Public Health at Lanzhou University, First Hospital of Lanzhou University, the Center for Evidence-Based Medicine of Lanzhou University and the School of Politics and International Relations at Lanzhou University.

Q: What are the major challenges for system operation and prediction?

Huang: The biggest challenge for the prediction model is improving accuracy. On the basis of traditional epidemiological models, we use advanced statistical-dynamic climate prediction to improve the traditional epidemiological models.

Using real-time updated epidemic data, we dynamically estimate and revise important parameters in the epidemiological model, such as infection rates, recovery rates and mortality rates, which greatly improves our prediction accuracy.

Q: How does the system predict the pandemic trend worldwide?

Huang: Based on the current transmission of the Omicron variant and control measures around the world, the latest prediction result of GPCP shows that the global pandemic is generally on a downward trend and could end in late 2023, with the total number of infections reaching at least 750 million.