• Environment
  • Poverty
  • Trade
  • Governance
  • Food
  • Urbanization
  • Aging
  • Gender
  • Migration
  • Data Visualization
  • Recommendations
  • Research & Analysis
  • Series
  • Interviews
  • About This Site
  • Submission Guidelines

Newsletter

Think Global Health

  • Environment
  • Poverty
  • Trade
  • Governance
  • Food
  • Urbanization
  • Aging
  • Gender
  • Migration
  • Data Visualization
  • Recommendations
  • Research & Analysis
  • Series
  • Interviews
  • About This Site
  • Submission Guidelines

Newsletter

Think Global Health

AI Health at the UN General Assembly

September 19, 2025

 

Editors' Note

Next week during the UN General Assembly's high-level meetings, a new topic will take center stage: inclusive and accountable governance of artificial intelligence (AI).  

Ethics will be central to deploying responsible AI for health. To ensure a successful adaptation in Africa, Dino Rech of the global health nonprofit Audere advises that AI's progress should not only be measured by rollout speed but by how it protects patient privacy and solves the daily problems people face.  

Continuing the conversation, Clinton Health Access Initiative's Sharmishta Sivaramakrishnan explains how Singapore's engagement with Africa is one of reciprocal learning. Singapore's capital and health system design experience can complement Africa's entrepreneurial drive to build sustainable AI models for health-care delivery. 

This edition pivots to financing for global health. As major funders, including the United States and European countries, scale back support for multilateral agencies, the world needs new financing strategies—ones that prioritize health production and invest in people-centered systems rooted in equity to maintain progress toward universal health coverage, say Neeraj Jain of the international global health nonprofit PATH and Githinji Gitahi of the Kenya-based health-care nongovernmental organization Amref Health Africa.  

To round off, TGH Research Associate Alejandra Martinez interviews former U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Tom Frieden on his new book, The Formula for Better Health: How to Save Millions of Lives—Including Your Own.  

Until next week!—Nsikan Akpan, Managing Editor, and Caroline Kantis, Associate Editor 

 

This Week's Highlights

GOVERNANCE

A medical laboratory technician at the Wits Antiviral Gene Therapy Research Unit poses for a portrait, in the research lab at the Wits University Faculty of Health Sciences, in Johannesburg, South Africa, on February 14, 2025.

The Ethics of AI-Driven Health Projects in Africa 

by Dino Rech

AI's success should be measured by how it respects dignity, protects privacy, and solves the problems people face 

Read this story

GOVERNANCE

Cancer patients sit in a chemotherapy while receiving treatment at the Korle Bu Teaching Hospital, in Accra, Ghana, on April 24, 2012.

Singapore to Africa: AI Diagnostics for a Healthier Future   

by Sharmishta Sivaramakrishnan 

Singapore's strengths can support Africa's push for faster, more equitable, and ultimately sovereign health systems 

Read this story

GOVERNANCE

A refugee from Myanmar has her checkup done by a doctor at the Mae Tao clinic, in Mae Sot, Thailand, on October 30, 2015.

Innovative Financing to Future-Proof Universal Health Coverage 

by Neeraj Jain and Githinji Gitahi

New financing models should invest in people-centered systems rooted in equity, prevention, and community leadership  

Read this story

 

Figure of the Week

Column chart showing the percentage of respondents of a Veterans Health Administration survey who reported burnout from 2018-2023
 

Recommended Feature

GOVERNANCE

The glass of the Center of Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) building is pockmarked by bullet holes, following a deadly shooting incident, in Atlanta, Georgia, on August 9, 2025.

The Formula: How to Protect Public Health Amid Rising Hostility 

by Alejandra Martinez  

How the public health community can counteract the growingly hostile rhetoric around science and medicine 

Read this story

 

What We're Reading

It Isn't Just the United States. The Whole World Has Soured on Climate Politics. (New York Times)

Kennedy's Vaccine Panel Expected to Recommend Delaying Hepatitis B Shot in Children (NPR) 

Japan Sets Record of Nearly 100,000 People Aged Over 100 (BBC)

"Direct Evidence of Genocidal Intent": The UN Commission of Inquiry's Report on Israel's Actions in Gaza (AP News)

Growing Trees on Farms Boosts Nutrition in Rural Malawi (Mongabay)

Israeli Doctors Reveal Their Conflicted Stories of Treating Palestinian Prisoners Held in Notorious "Black Site" Sde Teiman (The Conversation)

 

Interested in submitting?

Review our Submission Guidelines

Previous NewsletterBack to ArchiveNext Newsletter

Subscribe to Our Newsletter

Sign up for our weekly newsletter to stay up to stay up to date.

See Past Newsletters
About This SiteSubmission Guidelines

©2025 Council on Foreign Relations. All rights reserved. Privacy Policy and Terms of Use.