Blockchain and AI-based Solutions to Combat Coronavirus (COVID-19)-like Epidemics: A Survey

TL;DR

This survey reviews how blockchain and AI technologies are being used to combat COVID-19, highlighting innovative architectures, recent research, and future challenges in pandemic response.

Contribution

It introduces a new integrated architecture of blockchain and AI and surveys recent research, projects, and case studies on their application to COVID-19.

Findings

Blockchain enables early outbreak detection and reliable supply chains.

AI assists in symptom identification and drug development.

Federated AI can be effective for COVID-19 detection.

Abstract

The beginning of 2020 has seen the emergence of coronavirus outbreak caused by a novel virus called SARS-CoV-2. The sudden explosion and uncontrolled worldwide spread of COVID-19 show the limitations of existing healthcare systems in timely handling public health emergencies. In such contexts, innovative technologies such as blockchain and Artificial Intelligence (AI) have emerged as promising solutions for fighting coronavirus epidemic. In particular, blockchain can combat pandemics by enabling early detection of outbreaks, ensuring the ordering of medical data, and ensuring reliable medical supply chain during the outbreak tracing. Moreover, AI provides intelligent solutions for identifying symptoms caused by coronavirus for treatments and supporting drug manufacturing. Therefore, we present an extensive survey on the use of blockchain and AI for combating COVID-19 epidemics. First, we introduce a new conceptual architecture which integrates blockchain and AI for fighting COVID-19. Then, we survey the latest research efforts on the use of blockchain and AI for fighting COVID-19 in various applications. The newly emerging projects and use cases enabled by these technologies to deal with coronavirus pandemic are also presented. A case study is also provided using federated AI for COVID-19 detection. Finally, we point out challenges and future directions that motivate more research efforts to deal with future coronavirus-like epidemics.