The EIT Health Consultative Group submitted this report to provide informed views on the European Commission’s Data Strategy and AI White Paper.

EIT Health is a network of approximately 150 partners, made up of leading organisations and institutions from academia, business, research and healthcare delivery brought together to answer some of the biggest healthcare and ageing challenges facing our society today. As a Knowledge and Innovation Community (KIC) of the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT), EIT Health collaborates across borders via: innovation projects, entrepreneurship/business creation, and professional education incubation.

EIT Health has set up a small Consultative Group (CG) of senior leaders from some of its partner organisations to provide views on policy issues in health innovation raised by the European Commission or other European Institutions. Professor Theodore Christakis, Chair on the Legal and Regulatory Implications of Artificial Intelligence at the Multidisciplinary Institute of Artificial Intelligence (MIAI) and co-director of the Grenoble Alpes Data Institute represents University Grenoble Alpes as a member of this Consultative Group.

The Group does not seek consensus, but rather intends to provide informed views to support policymakers with evidence and thoughtful reflections from the ‘coal face’ of innovation in the sector.

The sections below set out the key areas of input to EU policy makers in responding to the particular regulatory and policy needs of the use of AI and data-rich solutions in health and healthy aging innovation.

They all relate to the themes of the Data Strategy and AI White Paper:

1. Securing access to data – clarity of data processing rules, security and availability of data

2. Building trust in AI – the transparency and explainability of AI

3. Risk management

4. Applicability and application of existing medical/health legislation, including liability

5. International dimension

The recent COVID-19 pandemic has sharpened reflections on the issues, as well as demonstrated positive and fast responses to a global challenge that have provided many learnings.

This Report has been published in the EIT Health website and is cross-posted here with the kind permission of EIT Health. It can be downloaded by following the link on the right side of the page.