As engineers, is there something we can do to help, in some way, with the covid19 situation?
I've never been involved in social impact coding. I've often thought Code for America to be an awesome initiative, but always struggled to see how coding can help big social issues.
Is there something we can do now?
I don't have a solution but if anyone has any contacts in media or thoughts on how you can get more BASIC supplies to our hospitals and clinics we are desperate.
We need facemasks (any) and bleach wipes. So much of our supply has been stolen by family members and visitors.
In Tokyo, Japan, the government publishes a web site providing the information about it:
https://stopcovid19.metro.tokyo.lg.jp (You can select the language on left bottom)
and it's source code is hosted on GitHub: https://github.com/tokyo-metropolitan-gov/covid19
and the contribution guide is also provided: https://github.com/tokyo-metropolitan-gov/covid19/blob/development/README_EN.md
It is led by an organization "Code for Japan".
And it was forked to Hokkaido prefecture version https://github.com/codeforsapporo/covid19 (though Hokkaido version does not seem to provide English documents).
I think this can be a cue to find something coders can contribute.
Build informative and fun applications to help prevent the spread. Here is an example: https://flattenthecurve.herokuapp.com/. Or all the corona virus map apps. Good luck.