Social Vulnerabilities Indices

Description of the project

Social vulnerability refers to the potential negative effects on communities caused by external stresses on human health. Such stresses include natural or human-caused disasters, or disease outbreaks. Reducing social vulnerability can decrease both human suffering and economic loss. SVI ranks the tracts on 16 social factors, including unemployment, racial and ethnic minority status, and disability, and further groups them into four related themes. Thus, each tract receives a ranking for each Census variable and for each of the four themes as well as an overall ranking. SVI provides specific socially and spatially relevant information to help public health officials and local planners better prepare communities to respond to emergency events such as severe weather, floods, disease outbreaks, or chemical exposure.

 Aim 

To automate the process of calculating SVI with the use of R, with API

Dataset

Indiana specific

Key findings

According to the analysis, the SVI scores of the Indiana counties closely match the SVI scores from the excel worksheet and the ‘RPL_THEMES’ column in the CDC website’s downloaded .csv file.

Workflow

API Integration:

   – Use an API to fetch the relevant data.

R Code Execution:

   – Develop and execute R code to perform SVI calculations.

Data Output Preparation:

   –  Prepare the output data for further analysis or presentation.

   – Arrange the output columns in a structured format based on the specific requirements and desired presentation style.

Review and Validation:

   – Review the outputs to ensure that the data is correctly arranged and meets the intended objectives.

   – Validate the data for accuracy and consistency to avoid any potential errors or discrepancies.

Documentation and Reporting:

   – Document the workflow steps, including API integration details, R code snippets, and outputs, for future reference and replication.

   – Generate reports and presentations to communicate findings and insights.

Team members

Bhushan Shelke

Atmuri Yagna Praseeda