Improving mobile COVID vaccination efforts through GIS mapping

A targeted mobile vaccination center deployed in a sports hall in Préverenges. PCI / Vaud - EPFL has teamed up with Vaud Canton's Office for Civil Protection and General Health Office to deploy targeted mobile COVID vaccination centers and inform high risk groups about the importance of getting vaccinated in order to stem the pandemic. Anaïs Ladoy, a PhD candidate at EPFL's Laboratory of Geographic Information Systems (LASIG), was working on chronic disease prevention when her research took a completely unexpected turn in March 2021. That's when someone from Vaud Canton's General Health Office (DGS) asked if she and her supervisor could help the DGS plan the Canton's mobile vaccination campaign.  "As part of my thesis, I had already met with members of the DGS," says Ladoy. "I had already visited their headquarters, and they were familiar with my methodological approach." Her thesis, which she began in January 2019, involved mapping chronic diseases and health problems - such as diabetes, heart disease and obesity - across Vaud Canton with the goal of improving the targeting of prevention campaigns. Phase one Ladoy and her supervisor Stéphane Joost, a senior lecturer and researcher, agreed to help. The pair had only ten days to develop a methodology and identify locations where the temporary vaccination centers should be deployed.