[creato]

How does something like this really help? It seems like an automated phone answering system for COVID testing. This seems like, maybe, 0.1% of the problem we have in this country with dealing with this virus. I'm not saying it's unhelpful, just that it doesn't seem all that helpful either. It seems like a bunch of hot air from Trump and Google.

Also, isn't verily a bioscience company? I would expect them to be working on testing, or treatments, or almost anything other than a website. This drastically lowers my opinion of what I thought verily was, which admittedly, I didn't know much, I just figured it would being doing something a little more "hands on" here. Hopefully they're doing that too...

Also:

> Your data collected by Verily through the testing program will never be joined with your data stored in Google products without your explicit permission.

Who outside of even a subset of software engineers know what this means?

[throwaway490194]

Better data improves the probability of "flattening the curve" to avoid overwhelming the health care system. Many lives can be saved if this can be achieved. In Italy they failed to do this, ran out of ventilators, and people are dying who would not otherwise be dying. For another example, google "flattening the curve st louis vs philadelphia 1919 swine flu".