University of Wisconsin-Madison agricultural building

Playing off of the name of the insanely popular smart phone and computer game, Candy Crush Saga, university experts have created a COVID-19-oriented game that they hope will be a life-saving smash hit.

University of Wisconsin-Madison social epidemiologist Malia Jones, and Caitlin Bourbeau, a member of the university's Applied Population Lab, created "COVID-19 Crush" so people can play out different social distancing situations to see how the disease spreads in these scenarios. The imagined social distancing situations take place in a pool of 1,000 dots, each of which are supposed to represent a single person.

The purpose of the game is to show people what could happen to them and their communities as social distancing restrictions are relaxed, the university explains in a post.

The school says Jones and Bourbeau were already developing a game devoted to the concept of herd immunity when the COVID-19 pandemic hit.

It might be worth it for building service contractors, jan/san distributors and facility managers to try out the COVID-19 Crush. And if they find the game informative and helpful, they can share it with customers and building occupants. After all, the actions of their clients or building occupants will go along way in determining how the pandemic progresses.