Asia-Pacific Digital Health Innovation: Technology, Trust, and the Role of APEC

This event is part of the series Exploring APEC’s Role in Facilitating Regional Cooperation.

Digital health technologies hold great promise to strengthen health systems in the Asia-Pacific region and provide affordable access for remote and vulnerable populations. But what is the evidence about how digital health initiatives work in practice in low resource settings? What incentive structures and provider skillsets are needed to improve health equity, health service quality, and health system resilience at an affordable cost? What is the role of APEC in promoting these innovations while also addressing concerns about data privacy and security? This colloquium explores these questions with case studies from South and Southeast Asia. Our three expert speakers discuss how APEC members are actively experimenting with “innovative digital health solutions to increase access to, and delivery of, health services,” as highlighted in the Chair's Statement of the 13th APEC High-Level Meeting on Health and the Economy. 

Panelists:

CK Cheruvettolil, Senior Strategy Officer, Digital Health and Artificial Intelligence, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

CK Cheruvettolil is a Senior Strategy Officer on the Gates Foundation Artificial Intelligence Taskforce. He leads the deployment of AI solutions in Asia and works closely with governments, public health agencies and health service providers to identify and fund digital technologies that could have impact. CK has been at the Gates Foundation for 12 years in a variety of roles including financing and strategy for global vaccine development and disease surveillance. 
Prior to joining the Gates Foundation, CK spent 8-years as a consultant to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In this capacity, he played a crucial role in designing the technical framework for the Environmental Public Health Tracking Network.

Kiran Gopal Vaska, Director of the National Health Authority of India

Mr. Kiran Gopal Vaska is an officer of the Indian Administrative Service (IAS) currently working at the National Health Authority, New Delhi. In his earlier roles, he worked at various levels of government in the areas of power, rural development, health and family welfare, education, and industrial development, among others. As Managing Director of MP Eastern Zone Power Distribution Company, he led the digitization of the company including GIS mapping of the entire power network, introduction of smart meter technologies, and more. He led the development of an online single window system and was instrumental in Madhya Pradesh state ranking among the top 5 states in Ease of Doing Business (EoDB) in India for 2016. Before joining government service, he worked in the finance industry performing risk analytics for hedge funds and banks.

Moderator:

​​Dr. Siyan Yi, Assistant Professor and Director of Integrated Research Program at National University of Singapore; 2011-12 Developing Asia Health Policy Fellow, Shorenstein APARC

Dr. Yi is a medical doctor and an infectious disease epidemiologist by training. He received his PhD from the School of International Health of the University of Tokyo in Japan in 2010. He was a postdoctoral fellow at the Asia Health Policy Program, Walter H. Shorenstein Asia Pacific Research Center, Stanford University from 2011-2012. He is an Assistant Professor and Director of the Integrated Research Program at Saw Swee Hock School of Public Health, National University of Singapore. He also serves as Director of KHANA Center for Population Health Research in Cambodia and Adjunct Associate Professor at Touro University California, the United States. His implementation research program focuses on developing and evaluating community-based innovative interventions for improving access to prevention, treatment, and care services for HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, sexual and reproductive health, and maternal and child health among vulnerable and marginalized populations in Southeast Asia.

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