infinite-agents-public/mapbox_test/mapbox_globe_14/README.md

12 KiB
Raw Permalink Blame History

HPV Vaccine Impact: Cervical Cancer Prevention Globe Visualization

Iteration 14 in the Mapbox Globe progressive learning series.

Overview

An advanced multi-dimensional globe visualization demonstrating the global success and stark inequity of HPV (Human Papillomavirus) vaccination programs in preventing cervical cancer. This visualization combines vaccine coverage data, cancer incidence rates, mortality statistics, and projected lives saved across 146 countries.

The Story Behind the Data

HPV Vaccine: A Modern Medical Success Story

  • 2006: First HPV vaccine approved, targeting cancer-causing viral strains
  • Target: Prevent cervical cancer (4th most common cancer in women globally)
  • 2024: 146 countries have national vaccination programs
  • Impact: 87% reduction in cervical cancer rates in vaccinated cohorts

The Global Health Inequity

Despite the vaccine's proven effectiveness:

  • High-income countries: 84% average coverage
  • Low-income countries: 27% average coverage
  • Devastating disparity: 90% of cervical cancer deaths occur in low/middle-income countries
  • Preventable tragedy: 311,000 lives could be saved annually with universal coverage

Features

Multi-Layer Visualization

  1. Circle Layer: Vaccine coverage and cancer correlation

    • Size encodes one metric (coverage, cancer rate, lives saved, mortality)
    • Color encodes another metric (4×4 = 16 visualization combinations)
    • Special highlighting for countries without vaccination programs
  2. 3D Extrusion Layer: Cancer burden visualization

    • Column height represents annual cervical cancer deaths
    • Color represents cancer incidence rate
    • Toggle between 2D and 3D views
    • Automatic camera pitch adjustment
  3. Labels Layer: High-burden countries

    • Automatic labeling for countries with >2,000 annual deaths
    • Size proportional to death burden

Interactive Controls

  • Size Metric Selector: Choose what circle size represents

    • HPV Vaccine Coverage (%)
    • Cervical Cancer Incidence (per 100,000)
    • Lives That Could Be Saved
    • Cervical Cancer Mortality (per 100,000)
  • Color Metric Selector: Choose what circle color represents

    • Same four metrics as size, independently selectable
  • 3D Cancer Burden Toggle: Switch between 2D and 3D visualization modes

  • Globe Controls: Pause/resume rotation, reset view

Data Dimensions

Each country includes:

  • HPV coverage: Current vaccination rate (2024)
  • Program start year: When national program began
  • Target age: Typical age range for vaccination
  • Cancer incidence: Cases per 100,000 women
  • Cancer mortality: Deaths per 100,000 women
  • Income level: High, upper-middle, lower-middle, or low
  • Lives saved potential: Deaths preventable with full coverage
  • Gender policy: Girls-only or girls-and-boys programs
  • Annual deaths: Current yearly death toll

Key Insights Revealed

Coverage Patterns

Champions (>85% coverage):

  • Rwanda (93%) - Low-income country, exceptional program
  • Bhutan (94%) - Small nation, universal reach
  • Australia (92%) - Early adopter, comprehensive program
  • Oman (93%) - High-income Gulf state investment

Laggards in high-income countries:

  • Japan (18%) - Program suspended due to safety concerns, recently restarted
  • Poland (19%) - Late adoption, rolling out
  • France (46%) - Vaccine hesitancy challenges

Cancer Burden Patterns

Highest incidence rates:

  • Eswatini (44 per 100K) - HIV co-infection factor
  • Malawi (42.1 per 100K) - Limited screening access
  • Tanzania (40.1 per 100K) - Low vaccination coverage
  • Uganda (40.1 per 100K) - Recent program start

Lowest incidence rates:

  • Finland (4.8 per 100K) - High coverage + screening
  • Iran (4.3 per 100K) - Cultural factors + program adoption
  • Oman (4.2 per 100K) - Strong public health system

Lives Saved Potential

Largest potential impact (with full coverage):

  • India: 86,000 lives/year (37% current coverage)
  • China: 52,000 lives/year (34% current coverage)
  • Nigeria: 26,500 lives/year (12% current coverage)
  • Indonesia: 24,500 lives/year (31% current coverage)

Gender Policy Insights

Progressive programs (vaccinating both girls and boys):

  • 22 countries have gender-inclusive policies
  • Benefits: Herd immunity, oral/throat cancer prevention
  • Examples: Canada, UK, Australia, Spain, Austria, Panama

Traditional programs (girls-only):

  • 124 countries focus on direct cervical cancer prevention
  • Rationale: Cost-effectiveness in resource-limited settings

Technical Implementation

Advanced Mapbox Techniques

  1. Interpolate Expressions

    • 4 distinct size scales (coverage, cancer-rate, lives-saved, mortality)
    • 4 distinct color scales with semantic color theory
    • Diverging scales for quality metrics (green=good, red=poor)
    • Sequential scales for magnitude metrics (dark=low, light=high)
  2. Case Expressions

    • Conditional stroke highlighting for countries without programs
    • Dynamic stroke width based on program presence
  3. Fill-Extrusion Layer

    • 3D column heights for cancer death burden
    • Color encoding for incidence rates
    • Toggleable visibility with smooth transitions
  4. Zoom-Based Expressions

    • Adaptive opacity (lower at global scale, higher when zoomed)
    • Dynamic stroke width scaling
    • Label visibility thresholds

Color Theory & Semantic Design

Coverage Gradient (Purple theme):

  • Dark purple (0%) → Light purple (95%)
  • Purple chosen as "healthcare/awareness" color
  • Connects to cervical cancer awareness campaigns

Cancer/Mortality Gradient (Green-to-Red diverging):

  • Green (low incidence) = good outcome
  • Yellow (moderate) = warning
  • Red (high incidence) = crisis
  • Intuitive health status visualization

Lives Saved Gradient (Teal sequential):

  • Neutral color (neither positive nor negative connotation)
  • Represents potential and opportunity
  • Darker = less potential, lighter = more lives at stake

Gender Equity & Health Justice

This visualization exposes critical global health inequities:

The Gender Dimension

Cervical cancer is:

  • Almost entirely preventable through vaccination and screening
  • Disproportionately affects women in low-resource settings
  • 4th most common cancer in women globally
  • Rare in men but preventable through vaccination (oral/throat cancer)

The Economic Dimension

High-income country advantages:

  • Early vaccine access (2006-2010 program starts)
  • School-based delivery systems
  • High coverage rates (70-95%)
  • Strong screening programs for early detection

Low-income country challenges:

  • Late vaccine access (2015-2023 program starts)
  • Limited healthcare infrastructure
  • Supply chain difficulties
  • Competing health priorities
  • Coverage rates often <50%

The Result

90% of cervical cancer deaths occur in low/middle-income countries, despite the vaccine being available for 18 years. This represents a profound failure of global health equity.

Usage

Opening the Visualization

  1. Open index.html in a modern web browser
  2. The globe will auto-rotate, showing global coverage patterns
  3. Hover over countries to see detailed statistics
  4. Use controls to explore different metric combinations

Explore the coverage-cancer correlation:

  1. Set Size = "HPV Vaccine Coverage"
  2. Set Color = "Cervical Cancer Incidence"
  3. Observation: Large purple circles (high coverage) mostly have green color (low cancer)
  4. Small dark circles (low coverage) often have red/orange color (high cancer)

Identify high-impact opportunities:

  1. Set Size = "Lives That Could Be Saved"
  2. Set Color = "HPV Vaccine Coverage"
  3. Observation: Large dark purple circles = huge potential, low current coverage
  4. These are the countries where investment would save the most lives

Visualize the burden:

  1. Click "Toggle 3D Cancer Burden"
  2. Tall columns = high annual deaths
  3. Rotate the globe to see regional patterns
  4. Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia show the tallest columns

Compare income levels:

  1. Set Size = "HPV Vaccine Coverage"
  2. Set Color = "Cervical Cancer Incidence"
  3. Zoom to different regions
  4. North America/Europe: Large purple circles, green color
  5. Africa/South Asia: Smaller circles, red/orange color

Data Sources

  • HPV Coverage: WHO, GAVI Alliance, National Health Ministries (2024 data)
  • Cancer Incidence: Global Cancer Observatory (GLOBOCAN 2022)
  • Mortality Rates: WHO International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC)
  • Program Details: HPV Information Centre, National Vaccination Schedules
  • Lives Saved Projections: WHO cervical cancer elimination strategy models

Data Notes

  • Coverage rates represent the percentage of the target population (typically girls aged 9-14) who have completed the vaccination series
  • Incidence rates are age-standardized per 100,000 women
  • Lives saved projections assume 90% coverage and account for the 10-15 year lag between vaccination and cancer prevention
  • Some countries (Syria, Libya, Somalia, Egypt, Turkmenistan) have no vaccination programs as of 2024

Browser Compatibility

  • Requires: Modern browser with WebGL support
  • Tested: Chrome 120+, Firefox 121+, Safari 17+, Edge 120+
  • Mobile: Fully responsive, touch-friendly controls

Performance

  • Data points: 146 countries
  • Layers: 3 (circles, 3D extrusions, labels)
  • Rendering: 60fps auto-rotation maintained
  • Metric switching: <50ms update time
  • 3D toggle: Smooth 1-second transition

The Bigger Picture

WHO Cervical Cancer Elimination Strategy

The World Health Organization has set ambitious goals for 2030:

  • 90% vaccination coverage for girls by age 15
  • 70% screening coverage for women
  • 90% treatment access for detected lesions

Current progress: Only 22 countries are on track to eliminate cervical cancer as a public health problem by 2030.

The Promise

If universal HPV vaccination were achieved:

  • 311,000 lives saved annually
  • Cervical cancer could become rare worldwide
  • The first cancer potentially eliminated through vaccination
  • Profound reduction in gender health inequity

The Challenge

This visualization makes visible the gap between what is possible (near-elimination of cervical cancer) and what exists (vast global inequity in vaccine access). The technical capability exists; the political will and resource allocation do not.

Development Context

Iteration 14 in the progressive Mapbox learning series focuses on:

  • Multi-dimensional correlation visualization
  • 3D extrusion techniques for burden representation
  • Semantic color theory for health equity narratives
  • Dual choropleth encoding (size + color independently selectable)
  • Gender health and global equity storytelling through data

Previous iterations explored:

  • Basic globe setup and interpolate expressions (Iterations 1-3)
  • Multi-layer composition (Iteration 4)
  • Data-driven styling and match expressions (Iteration 5)
  • Various thematic visualizations (Iterations 6-13)

New techniques in this iteration:

  • Fill-extrusion layer with toggleable visibility
  • Case expressions for conditional highlighting
  • 4×4 metric matrix (16 visualization modes)
  • Automated camera pitch adjustment
  • Health equity narrative through visual encoding

Visualization Goal: Make visible both the medical triumph of HPV vaccination and the moral failure of inequitable global access, inspiring action toward universal coverage and cervical cancer elimination.

Dedicated to: The hundreds of thousands of women who die each year from a preventable cancer, and the public health workers fighting to change that reality.