Today, we’ve heard about 1492, the secret Skunkworks Lab from Amazon. What’s this all about? Well, it seems that’s like Amazon is investing heavily in the future of healthcare through Artificial Intelligence and Cloud data storage. So, are they the first? No, they’re certainly not. We’ve got Google, IBM, Microsoft among other players working in their space. They’re trying to solve the big issues like cancer. So, are we going to live forever? What is this technology going to do for us?
My Thoughts
So, we know that Amazon has been developing all sorts of technology over the years. They now a half-trillion-dollar business.
Their founder Jeff Bezos, was today, actually, highlighted as briefly being the world’s richest man. This is a company with a leader that is not fearful of trying new things, dominating new spaces.
The healthcare areas with something like three trillion dollars annually, so, from their perspective it’s worth investing into. There have been lots of developments in the space, though.
Microsoft, some months ago, talk publicly about their developments trying to solve cancer through accessing masses of patient records, putting all this information together, trying to deliver results that can’t be delivered by individual doctors. And that’s one of the possibilities of this technology.
Google will be working here through their acquisition of deep mind. They’ll be working with one of the largest hospitals in the world, in the UK, with their analysing data that are collected when they’re testing people’s eyes.
Now, by utilising Artificial Intelligence technology, they expect to see a big reduction in the number of people that are impacted with blindness through age-related macular degeneration.
So, Artificial Intelligence technology can really deliver some great stuff. In terms of us living forever, well, I’m not too sure about that one but we certainly will see continuous improvement going forward.
Amazon are also within their developments that appears, looking at how to store patient records and that information.
Once that stuff is stored centrally, it makes it makes it easier for you to get access to it when you’re travelling, when you’re in different locations, if you change who is your primary doctor then that should benefit you.
Yes, there’s some risks around security of information that we’ll need to think about. Cyber-security, what will a big company like Amazon do with our data.
Looking back a few years, we heard about target in the U.S who looked at individual shopping habits and in one case was able to pick that a teenager was pregnant before she even knew about it based on the thing she was buying.
So, data can do some incredible things when, the sort of technology is applied. So there, we got great things ahead in the space. A very, very interesting area to watch.
My recommendations for you? Keep a track on what’s happening, encourage your healthcare professionals to be utilising technology, maybe they can provide you with your personal healthcare records, digitally share those with you.
There really are lots of possibilities. Try out things like a health tracker or fitness tracker, so, you get used to collecting your own information. See how that can encourage you to be healthier.
For businesses that are in the healthcare space, whether they’re doctors, medical specialists and so on, well you should make sure you keep at the forefront of technology to deliver the best results for your patients and make sure you keep secure from that cyber-security perspective.
Hey, that’s it for me this week. Look, I can’t give you an answer right now with the technology and Artificial Intelligence is going to help you live forever but look, we’re hitting on the right track. You can get more from me on my updates paulspain.com/updates.