Explanation of hand, foot, and mouth disease cases in Japan using Google Trends before and during the COVID-19: infodemiology study.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic affects common diseases, but its impact on hand, foot, and mouth disease (HFMD) is unclear. Google Trends data is beneficial for approximate real-time statistics and because of ease in access, is expected to be used for infection explanation from an information-seeking behavior perspective. We aimed to explain HFMD cases before and during COVID-19 using Google Trends.

Methods

HFMD cases were obtained from the National Institute of Infectious Diseases, and Google search data from 2009 to 2021 in Japan were downloaded from Google Trends. Pearson correlation coefficients were calculated between HFMD cases and the search topic "HFMD" from 2009 to 2021. Japanese tweets containing "HFMD" were retrieved to select search terms

SUBMITTER: Niu Q 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9617033 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature