Access to health is a major concern, and it's even more top
of mind these days for general public and for leaders alike.
In the next coming years, we'll have to deal with two issues.
One is that we'll have to operate with resource
constraints.
Two is that we'll have to face a rising burden of chronic
diseases.
What does equitable access mean?
It means that all populations would have the same access to
health care services and products.
But today it's not the case.
We have underserved populations in high income and in low income
countries alike.
To give you an example, it's estimated that by 2030, the
world is going to be short of 10 million health care
professionals, seven of which will be in Middle East and
Africa.
To give you another example, even in the OECD countries we
observe variations in health outcomes, variations of maternal
mortality of 10X.
So what can digital do?
Digital can help us by solving access barriers such as cost,
such as distance or stigma or many others.
But it is very difficult to put in place.
We've had a number of very successful experiments and
pilots, a lot of things that we can learn from, but today they
struggle to reach scale.
The reason for that is that successful implementation of
digital solutions require the whole ecosystem to work
together, and for a whole ecosystem to align it takes a
lot of time.