Readout of White House Roundtable on Artificial Intelligence and Health

The White House Office of Science and Technology Policy this week convened a distinguished group of leaders from across sectors, including healthcare, academia, industry, and patient advocacy, for a discussion on how artificial intelligence (AI) can be safely deployed to improve health outcomes for all Americans.

This week’s roundtable highlighted the Biden-Harris Administration’s priorities to develop and deploy advanced AI tools that benefit the health and wellbeing of all Americans. The discussion focused on deepening awareness and understanding of the benefits and risks of AI and welcoming new ideas on the responsible development of AI. Working sessions focused on the specific use cases of AI that could inform decisions by the Biden-Harris Administration to advance progress in delivering benefits for:

• Clinical settings: where AI can be harnessed to improve individual patient care such as helping radiologists diagnose breast cancer, cutting their workload in half and getting diagnoses back to patients faster;
• Drug development: where AI can be used to streamline the discovery and testing of new drugs helping researchers design more effective treatments;
• Public health: where AI can be used to mitigate public health challenges, and improve access by supporting equitable health decision-making in resource limited settings.

Arati Prabhakar, Assistant to the President and Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP), encouraged roundtable participants to seize the powerful tools of AI to improve health outcomes for more Americans, while also leveraging best practices for effective risk management and mitigation.

Director Prabhakar highlighted the significant actions that the Biden-Harris Administration has taken on AI. She highlighted how the Administration has acted decisively to seize the tremendous promise posed by AI. Actions have included releasing the landmark Blueprint for an AI Bill of Rights, which identifies five principles that should guide the design, use, and deployment of automated systems to protect the American public in the age of artificial intelligence, and the Administration’s work to secure voluntary commitments from leading AI companies that will help move us towards safe, secure, and trustworthy development of AI technology. Further, the Biden-Harris Administration is currently developing an executive order that will ensure the federal government is doing everything in its power to advance safe and rights-respecting AI. 

Dr. Danielle Carnival, Deputy Assistant to the President for the Cancer Moonshot and OSTP Deputy Director for Health Outcomes, underscored the importance of convening leaders from across sectors to provide diverse perspectives and ensure that all Americans can benefit from the applications of AI in health. As the field of AI evolves rapidly and wider adoption of AI continues, the Biden-Harris Administration is working to ensure that Americans can safely benefit from applications of AI, including in health.

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