The big picture: Leveraging ICT to transform global healthcare

This article is an extract from out recent report Leveraging ICT to transform global healthcare. Download the report for the full insight. The Covid-19 global pandemic is accelerating digital transformation in every part of society including healthcare, a sector worth $8.5 trillion per year, which is five times more than telecoms. The transformation of healthcare inevitably will be difficult, complex and uneven, however, and the role for information, communications and technology (ICT) service providers is unclear.

The pandemic has profoundly changed the frontline delivery of healthcare services. Providers have always relied on people coming to them for diagnosis and treatment, but now they must communicate digitally with their patients. They are discovering that it may be safer and more efficient for doctors to treat 20 patients per day using teleconferencing services such as Zoom rather than receiving them in person.

Receiving patients digitally is one thing, but digitizing systems is something different altogether. Healthcare is characterized by an absolute focus on safety, security and privacy, and any attempts to automate processes and systems must ensure that they remain a priority. As for healthcare workers themselves and their willingness to embrace new digital ways of working, there is good reason to believe that new skills will not come easily. Clinicians do not typically seek out training in digital technologies. These challenges – and resistance to transformation – are not new. We have been talking about the need to digitize for close to 20 years. The question is whether the impact of Covid-19 will force healthcare to embrace digital capabilities, however uncomfortable that may be. If it does not, the ability to react more effectively to future pandemics will be limited.

Collaboration is key

Intergovernmental organizations continue to make the case for change. The United Nation’s (UN’s) Report of the Secretary General Roadmap for Digital Cooperation published in June notes that 53% of people in developing countries do not use the internet. Without extending connectivity, it will be extremely difficult to achieve the group’s 17 sustainable development goals for 2030. Similarly, the World Health Organization’s Global Action Plan for Healthy Lives and Well-being for All, an initiative designed to accelerate progress towards the healthrelated sustainable development goals, will need to be reviewed in light of Covid-19 and the digital response that it demands.

Coordination between agencies is essential, but there also needs to be engagement with national governments and with private sector organizations. Collaboration and information sharing to help contain the current pandemic can be a starting point. The stakes are high. If transformation does not happen, the current challenges in delivering healthcare to disadvantaged people across the world will only get bigger as economic hardship will inevitably follow the pandemic.

How can ICT help?

Providers of IT and ICT products and services are focusing on healthcare, some exclusively and others by selling across multiple verticals that include healthcare. IT providers generally deliver software technology and integration services to help healthcare providers, hospitals and pharmaceutical companies manage their businesses, while ICT providers deliver technology in conjunction with connectivity services. ICT providers include communications service providers (CSPs), systems integrators that often partner to deliver connectivity, and companies providing cloud-based services that necessarily require connectivity. This group includes hyperscale providers such as Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google and Microsoft. CSPs have long aspired to deliver connectivity services to the healthcare sector and healthcare services to consumers. Operators focusing on the former tend to be large, incumbent operators in developed markets that have robust enterprise lines of business. They already provide connectivity and communications services to hospitals, large public and private healthcare providers, insurance companies, and pharmaceutical firms, and they would like to deliver other services and capabilities such as security.

The aspiration to deliver healthcare services to consumers has mainly developed in mobile businesses – for example, initiatives to deliver simple healthcare information and advice or to bundle wearables and other smart home accessories. But like many other consumer sectors, telecoms operators have struggled to compete with over-the-top providers. The launch of 5G services is creating a new wave of interest in the healthcare sector. This time the focus is very much on the B2B opportunity and leveraging capabilities such as IoT and low-latency edge computing services.

The real question is: What role can CSPs play in delivering these services? Should they attempt to deliver full IT solutions that embed computing services, or should they sit further down in the value chain as enablers in partnership with cloud providers and systems integrators?

Big tech companies are poised to play a key role in healthcare digitization. Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud and Microsoft Azure are all targeting healthcare with a full range of cloud computing services and capabilities. Their growing expertise in analytics and AI also makes them natural partners for healthcare providers, although concerns about safety, privacy and trust could prove to be an obstacle.