Last week, Google AI pioneer Jad Tarifi sparked controversy when he told Business Insider that it no longer makes sense to get a medical degree - since, in his telling, artificial intelligence will render such an education obsolete by the time you're a practicing doctor. Companies have long touted the tech as a way to free up the time of overworked doctors and even aid them in specialized skills, including scanning medical imagery for tumors. Hospitals have already been rolling out AI tech to help with administrative work.
Google's Med-Gemini showcases advanced multimodal functions that potentially enhance workflows for clinicians, researchers, and patients, according to leaders Greg Corrado and Joëlle Barral.
Uncontrolled deployment of artificial intelligence in medicine could lead to contamination of electronic health records, resulting in data distortions and long-term deterioration in data interpretation models.
My time with Doctors Without Borders, as well as my ongoing humanitarian and anti-war advocacy, deeply informs this mission. Whether designing decision support or evaluating system impacts, I constantly reflect on how technology can serve, not replace, human care, especially in fragile or underserved contexts.