12-03-2025
Seeking: Responsible AI worldwide
WORLD VIEW
The World Health Organization will team up with a Dutch university to help its member countries adopt responsible artificial intelligence technologies, the global health body said earlier this month.
The WHO has designated a research center at Delft University of Technology as a WHO Collaborating Centre on AI for health governance. The Digital Ethics Centre in the Netherlands will research key AI health applications and help inform the WHO's guidance and policies on the technology.
Why it matters: The global health body said AI has the potential to reshape health care, save lives and improve health and well-being. But for that to happen, ethical safeguards must be included and evidence-based policies must be followed, the WHO said.
The WHO and the United Nations, its parent organization, aim to ensure that developing and wealthy countries benefit from the rapid development and adoption of AI while algorithms adhere to local laws without harming the public's health.
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This is where we explore the ideas and innovators shaping health care.
Robots could help parents have better conversations with their children, according to a small study published today in Science Robotics.
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FORWARD THINKING
Chronic disease rates among children may be higher than previously believed, according to new research published in Academic Pediatrics.
The share of people ages 5-25 with one or more chronic diseases rose from nearly 23 percent from 1999 to 2000 to more than 30 percent from 2017 to 2018, according to the researchers, from UCLA and Harvard.
A few diagnoses are behind the larger swell, researchers found: ADHD, ADD, autism, asthma, prediabetes, depression and anxiety.
'It is incumbent for the U.S. health system to seek ways to treat these patients in pediatric settings and eventually matriculate them into adult care,' the researchers wrote.
Why it matters: The incoming administration's health work, led by HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., promises to focus on better understanding and treating chronic diseases.
President Donald Trump created the Make America Healthy Again Commission, headed by Kennedy, to spearhead the work across agencies.
Even so: Kennedy has for years spread baseless claims about the cause of the rising chronic disease rates in kids — and that may influence the administration's approach to tackling the problem.
