The demand for the consumption of open data on health is multiplying

The Generalitat de Catalunya, through the Open Data Portal, works with the concept of open data by default. This represents a major change in the functioning of governments, which will have to justify the maintenance of closed data, and how they interact with citizens. Open data is valuable if it is relevant and will succeed if it is published quickly and comprehensively, gaining more value from those quality datasets that are comparable and can interact with each other (interoperable).

Collaboration between the Departments of Health and Foreign Affairs, Institutional Relations and Transparency has made it possible to open data. The Health and Open Data teams have worked in recent months to offer data sets in formats suitable for analysis and work by journalists and researchers, as well as in the publication of easy-to-read visualizations and accessibility for the general public.

Since the beginning of the COVID 19 pandemic, the Generalitat has made available to the public information on the effects of coronavirus in the different areas that affect the public, starting with health, but also on the workplace. economic or mobility, among others.

Datasets in health

Of the different areas, health brings together five datasets and concentrates 19% of visits to the portal (86,000 out of 447,500 total visits). Of these five, two have been among the most visited of the portal in just a few weeks, with a higher number of visits than other datasets in years. This is the case record data by Basic Health Area (ABS), first in the absolute ranking with almost 35,000 visits in 7 weeks. And the second case, that of cases per municipality already in third place with 24,000 visits in 7 weeks as well.

The portal also includes a new dashboard for tracking visits to COVID datasets. You can access it on the Open Data and COVID-19 page in the section “Statistics on the use of COVID datasets”.

Open data lets citizens know what officials and politicians are doing. This transparency can improve public services and help governments be held accountable. At the same time they can help drive inclusive economic development.