Global Health AI and Robotics

This session will highlight the potential of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in revolutionizing healthcare through improved diagnosis, treatment, and efficiency while emphasizing the importance of ensuring ethical AI practices. The transfer of research results to innovative products and services is important for the growth of economy, wealth, and quality of life. With the digital transformation our society experiences a rapid change of innovation activities. In the health sector, this requires not only a rapid assessment of the market potential of innovations but also its rapid testing for trustworthiness. This requires support from well-functioning innovation chains and cross-domain collaborations.

Therefore, in January this year Europe has launched the four Testing and Experimentation Facilities for AI and Robotics in the domains Healthcare, Smart Cities, Agriculture and Manufacturing. We put into focus potential and responsibilities in testing AI solutions (software and hardware) in large-scale and sustainable virtual or real environments; evaluation activities that facilitate market access for these trustworthy intelligent technologies, particularly by considering new regulatory requirements (certification, standardization, code of conduct, etc.), and ensuring easy access to these evaluation resources (e.g., link with health data sources).

This Session will also discuss the Global Initiative on AI for Health (GI-AI4H), which has been announced on July 6, 2023, by International Telecommunication Union (ITU), World Health Organization (WHO), and World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). The panel will also explore the role of ITU, WHO, and WIPO in promoting responsible healthcare AI by providing governance, standards, facilitating knowledge sharing, and supporting evidence-based implementation to address global health challenges and enable AI adoption in healthcare.