The medical information of patients is an intangible accumulation of capital that creates new wealth on a scale that cannot be estimated. The newly created wealth belongs to patients, doctors and health organizations (as trustees). The draft regulations overcome difficulties in safeguarding patients' privacy. But the big question that still remains unresolved in this framework is how patients and the public health system channel their property, medical information, to their advantage. What is the mechanism that will ensure that the pPatients' medical data represents a new form of intangible capital, an unprecedented source of wealth creation in the modern era. This new wealth belongs not only to patients but also to physicians and healthcare organizations, who serve as trustees of this sensitive information.
The current draft regulations make important strides in addressing patient privacy concerns. However, they leave a critical question unresolved: How can patients and the public healthcare system leverage ownership of medical data for their collective benefit?
A comprehensive framework is needed to ensure that the value generated from medical data is reinvested into strengthening the healthcare system, improving services, modernizing infrastructure, and ensuring equitable access for all.
Entrepreneurs and investors must be incentivized, and reasonable returns on innovation and risk-taking should be protected. At the same time, the wealth generated from medical big data must be earmarked for advancing research and developing digital health as a social good, not just as a commercial enterprise.
Without clear legislation regulating this issue, there is a real risk that this enormous wealth will be absorbed by global tech giants whose primary objective is profit. These companies may develop advanced technologies based on public health data, but such solutions could become inaccessible to large segments of the population, exacerbating health disparities and imposing additional costs on the public healthcare system.
roceeds of property are directed to strengthening the public health system, improving services, updating them and making them accessible to the entire population. The entrepreneur must be incentivized; the return on venture capital must be given; and the reward of big data — sacred to the development of research and digital medicine as social medicine. Without the regulation of this matter in primary legislation, there is concern that this huge wealth will pass to software giants whose main goal is profit. These will develop advanced technologies and applications that will not be accessible to all segments of the population and could widen health disparities even further, taking a toll on the public system.