Health and Artificial Intelligence: On the French Medical Council’s Report on the Impact of the Rollout of Digital Technology on the Practice of Medicine

There has been a whole host of publications in recent years on artificial intelligence (AI) – books, articles, reports, special issues, blogs – and no one could have missed the tide of material emphasizing both the immense opportunities opened up by that technology and the associated risks, particularly when it affects human beings through their data or, worse, in their physical being. The Futuribles International association has itself coordinated a huge project on this subject, an overview of which will shortly be published in these pages. André-Yves Portnoff, who has made a substantial contribution to this work, offers a “focus” here on a recent report by the French Medical Council dealing with the impact of AI – and also the other possibilities offered by digital technology, including big data – on health (medical opportunities, the practice of medicine, implications for patients etc.). Because health isn’t a “good” like any other (or, rather, because it is a good and not a product), the rollout of digital technology in this sector has to be handled with caution, in order to preserve the requisite empathy with patients. In this article, André-Yves Portnoff identifies the main findings of this report and the recommendations proposed by the Medical Council.