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Source: http://news.yahoo.com/nyc-health-dep...174623023.html
NYC Health Department Uses Yelp to Track Foodborne Illness
LiveScience.com
By By Bahar Gholipour, Staff Writer 1 hour ago
Using customer reviews of New York City restaurants on the online service Yelp, health investigators were able to identify outbreaks of foodborne illness that hadn't been reported to the health department.
The New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene worked with Columbia University and Yelp on a pilot project to explore the potential for using Yelp to identify unreported outbreaks, according to their report.
The researchers mined through about 294,000 restaurant reviews posted on Yelp over nine months during 2012 and 2013. To find the reviews likely of describing foodborne illness, the researchers looked for posts containing the keywords "sick," "vomit," "diarrhea" or "food poisoning."
The results showed that nearly 500 people had described an episode of symptoms consistent with foodborne illness. Only 3 percent of these incidents had been reported to New York City's nonemergency 311 services...
NYC Health Department Uses Yelp to Track Foodborne Illness
LiveScience.com
By By Bahar Gholipour, Staff Writer 1 hour ago
Using customer reviews of New York City restaurants on the online service Yelp, health investigators were able to identify outbreaks of foodborne illness that hadn't been reported to the health department.
The New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene worked with Columbia University and Yelp on a pilot project to explore the potential for using Yelp to identify unreported outbreaks, according to their report.
The researchers mined through about 294,000 restaurant reviews posted on Yelp over nine months during 2012 and 2013. To find the reviews likely of describing foodborne illness, the researchers looked for posts containing the keywords "sick," "vomit," "diarrhea" or "food poisoning."
The results showed that nearly 500 people had described an episode of symptoms consistent with foodborne illness. Only 3 percent of these incidents had been reported to New York City's nonemergency 311 services...