Trending Now
We have updated our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use for Eurasia Group and its affiliates, including GZERO Media, to clarify the types of data we collect, how we collect it, how we use data and with whom we share data. By using our website you consent to our Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy, including the transfer of your personal data to the United States from your country of residence, and our use of cookies described in our Cookie Policy.
{{ subpage.title }}
What AI could mean for healthcare
Researchers at the University of South Florida are using AI and virtual reality to study Alzheimer's disease and autism, mapping the brains of mice as they develop. A team from IBM and the Cleveland Clinic published a strategy for using AI to find new targets for immunotherapy. And a new startup is incorporating AI into CRISPR, the revolutionary gene-editing technique, to identify novel gene alterations not already found in nature to expand the possibilities of new treatments.
Meanwhile, a slew of new AI-powered cancer screenings have now been approved by the US Federal Drug Administration and are available for concerned patients, according to CNBC. That follows a trend: about 600 of the 900 AI and machine learning devices and programs approved by the FDA in the past five years have been radiology applications.
And patients could even find that their most ornery doctors are suddenly friendlier. Many report that ChatGPT and other tools have improved their virtual bedside manner over medical chat-based programs.
“It’s hard to overstate the potential that AI breakthroughs could have for nearly every aspect of healthcare, from our understanding of disease and designing new drugs to aspects of healthcare delivery like improving access through more efficient allocation of limited resources,” said Laura Yasaitis, a healthcare consultant for Eurasia Group.
Of course, she has concerns, such as overreliance on AI-generated output, privacy, and exacerbating inequities such as in approving or denying insurance claims.
And, at least for now, Yasaitis thinks that the most promising use of AI is, yes, the boring stuff.
“For every hour of direct patient care, doctors spend around two hours on paperwork during the day, and another one to two hours at night,” she said. “AI applications that can generate much of that content, and then only require review by clinicians, could dramatically reduce that burden.”
While these technologies offer hope for improving healthcare options and extending lives, insurers have yet to catch up. Medicare and private insurers tends not to cover AI-based tests. So when AI makes medical breakthroughs, there might be a delay for those who cannot afford to pay out of pocket.
How medical technology will transform human life - Siddhartha Mukherjee
On GZERO World, Ian Bremmer and Siddhartha Mukherjee explore the many ways medical technology will transform our lives and help humans surpass physical and mental limitations. Mukherjee, a cancer physician and biologist, believes artificial intelligence will help create whole categories of new medicines. AI can spit out molecules with properties we didn’t even know existed, which has tantalizing implications for diseases currently thought to be incurable. Recently discovered treatments for things like spinal muscular dystrophy, which used to be almost certainly deadly but is now being treated with gene therapy, are just the beginning of what could be possible using tools like CRISPR gene editing or bionic prosthetics.
Mukherjee envisions a future where people who are paralyzed by disease or stroke can walk again, where people with speech impairments can talk to their loved ones, and where prosthetics become much more effective and integrated into our bodies. And beyond curing ailments, biotechnology can help improve the lives of healthy people, optimizing things like brain power and energy.
“We will become smarter, we will become hopefully more disease resistant, we will have larger memory banks,” Mukherjee explains, “And we will have the capacity to interact in the virtual sphere in a way we cannot just simply interact in the real sphere.”
Watch the full interview: From CRISPR to cloning: The science of new humans
Catch GZERO World with Ian Bremmer every week at gzeromedia.com/gzeroworld or on US public television. Check local listings.
- From CRISPR to cloning: The science of new humans ›
- Podcast: Tracking the rapid rise of human-enhancing biotech with Siddhartha Mukherjee ›
- AI agents are here, but is society ready for them? ›
- Steven Pinker shares his "relentless optimism" about human progress ›
- What is CRISPR? Gene editing pioneer Jennifer Doudna explains ›
- CRISPR gene editing and the human race ›
Siddhartha Mukherjee: CRISPR, AI, and cloning could transform the human race
Technologies like CRISPR gene editing, synthetic biology, bionics integrated with AI, and cloning will create "new humans," says Dr. Siddhartha Mukherjee.
On GZERO World, Ian Bremmer sits down with the cancer physician and biologist to discuss some of the recent groundbreaking developments in medical technology that are helping to improve the human condition. Mukherjee points to four tools that have sped up our understanding of how the human body works: gene editing with CRISPR, AI-powered prosthetics, cloning, and synthetic biology. Gene editing with CRISPR allows humans to make precise alterations in the genome and synthetic biology means you can create a genome similar to writing a computer code.
“That technology is groundbreaking, and it really shook our worlds because I hadn’t expected it,” Mukherjee says.
Mukherjee also talks about bionic prosthetics that help us extend our hands, brains, and other body parts with artificial intelligence. AI learning algorithms mean that prosthetics like neural implants can work more efficiently, adapting to each body's specific environment and making them more effective. The last tool Mukherjee highlights is cloning, a technology that’s been around for decades but has recently become much faster and easier. Right now, these four technologies are sitting in different silos. In the near future, however, some combination of these tools will be applied to real individuals, which will profoundly impact the medical landscape of biological science and lead to what Mukherjee calls “the new human.”
Watch the full interview: From CRISPR to cloning: The science of new humans
Catch GZERO World with Ian Bremmer every week at gzeromedia.com/gzeroworld or on US public television. Check local listings.
The US passed a grim milestone this week, surpassing 500,000 deaths from COVID-19, the highest total death toll in the world. COVID has now outpaced other killer diseases like cancer and heart disease to become the leading US cause of death. As a result, life expectancy in pandemic-ravaged America dropped by a year to 77.8 in the first half of 2020 — the largest dip since World War II. But there is some good news on the horizon: COVID hospitalizations and deaths are falling fast while the vaccine rollout picks up steam. To contextualize the scope of the crisis in America, we compare the average number of daily deaths from COVID over the past year to deaths from heart disease and cancer during the same period.
The Graphic Truth: COVID vs cancer, heart disease in US
The US passed a grim milestone this week, surpassing 500,000 deaths from COVID-19, the highest total death toll in the world. COVID has now outpaced other killer diseases like cancer and heart disease to become the leading US cause of death. As a result, life expectancy in pandemic-ravaged America dropped by a year to 77.8 in the first half of 2020 — the largest dip since World War II. But there is some good news on the horizon: COVID hospitalizations and deaths are falling fast while the vaccine rollout picks up steam. To contextualize the scope of the crisis in America, we compare the average number of daily deaths from COVID over the past year to deaths from heart disease and cancer during the same period.
Health of wife of Indonesia's former President Yudhoyono worsens
JAKARTA - The health of the wife of Indonesia's former President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has taken a turn for the worse on Wednesday (May 29).
India's ailing finance minister quits government
NEW DELHI (AFP) - India's influential but ailing finance minister Arun Jaitley announced on Wednesday (May 29) that he would not serve in Prime Minister Narendra Modi's new Hindu nationalist government because of poor health.
Hong Kong domestic worker fired for cancer awarded damages
HONG KONG (AFP) - A domestic worker sacked after a cancer diagnosis was awarded damages by a Hong Kong court on Monday (April 15), in a case that highlighted exploitation of foreign women toiling as maids in the wealthy financial hub.