Lauren Gardner, PhD, has received the 2022 Lasker-Bloomberg Public Service Award for creating the COVID-19 dashboard. The tool went on to become the world's most trusted source for real-time data about the SARS-CoV-2 virus' spread.
The dashboard has been accessed hundreds of billions of times since its launch in January 2020.
"By launching this global COVID-19 surveillance tool, she provided accessible and reliable information about the spread of an emerging infectious disease, thereby filling a void in the international public health system and establishing a model to emulate," the Lasker Foundation said in its Sept. 28 recipient announcement. "This dashboard is a centerpiece in situation rooms around the world."
Dr. Gardner is a professor of civil systems engineering at Baltimore-based Johns Hopkins University. She developed the dashboard with doctoral student Ensheng Dong.
The Lasker-Bloomberg Public Service award is given to recipients whose efforts improve the public's understanding of medical research, public health or healthcare, or who have benefited many people's lives through public health practice. Click here to see the 2022 recipients in two other Lasker award categories.