In 2020 they were produced 64.2 zettabytes of data globally, also due to the pandemic. According to Idc Global DataSphere, we are facing an exponential trend that will hit share in 2025 163 zettabytes. We are faced with an immense “datasphere”, if one thinks only of the fact that a zettabyte is equivalent to a thousand billion gigabytes. Data is the new “black gold” of the millennium and the most sensitive, the health ones, have an even greater value. Through artificial intelligence systems it is possible to extract from this immense patrimony an unimaginable quantity of useful indications both for research and for the medical clinic. They are the basis of the development of the so-called “personalized” medicine.
The proposal of a group of experts
But how can you use them, what are the boundaries within which to move and what are the ethical, legal and social aspects to take into account? A group of experts in medicine, computer science and bioethics together with representatives from the world of patients, gathered by the Smith Kline Foundation, has developed a proposal for a National Health Repository. What is that? “A centralized IT container owned and publicly governed by which AI software can process information that is useful for everyone’s health care “, he summarizes Alberto Malva, coordinator of the project contained in the policy document «Artificial Intelligence, Healthcare and Biomedical Research in Italy: proposal for a National Healthcare Repository».
What could have happened during the pandemic emergency
«Artificial intelligence applied to medicine allows software to acquire and process data in order to support healthcare personnel in their decisions“Explains Malva.” Try for a moment to imagine how the country could have been react and manage the health emergency if we had available tools capable of diagnosing Sars-Cov-2 virus disease with accuracy comparable to the swab test through a simple blood sample ». «Or support non-specialist medical personnel for the radiological diagnosis even in moments of great work overload and lack of personnel, or even remotely monitor the hemoglobin saturation and respiratory rate parameters via the normal video camera on the smartphones of patients in isolation ».
How does it work
The our National Health Service is based on the principle of mutual solidarity between citizens. Read in terms of digital health, this principle would translate into “conscious” donation of their health data to the NHS sharing them within the national public repository so that AI can use them for the benefit of everyone’s health. Sure they pose a number of questions about the collection and management of health data, also with respect to their possible sale to commercial subjects albeit in the face of a “return” for the community. «The ethical, legal and social aspects of the implementation of a National Health Repository as well as the regulatory implications they must be understood, analyzed and shared between experts and citizens. If fear and fear prevail, no technology, however potentially effective, can ever benefit society ”, concludes Malva.
April 29, 2021 (change April 29, 2021 | 17:41)
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