Speeches
SPEECH BY MR ONG YE KUNG, MINISTER FOR HEALTH AND COORDINATING MINISTER FOR SOCIAL POLICIES AT THE 9TH CHI INNOVATE CONFERENCE
10 July 2025
Mr. Tan Tee How, Chairman, NHG Health
Professor Joe Sim, Group Chief Executive Officer (CEO), NHG Heath
Professor Eugene Soh, Deputy CEO, NHG Health
Colleagues, partners, ladies and gentlemen
Innovation – A Human, not a Technological, Endeavour
1. A very good morning. We all know an AI revolution is before us.
2. I have made a number of speeches on AI innovation in healthcare recently. I have described the approach we are taking, I have talked about what foundations we have laid, the use cases we are prioritising, and how we are encouraging lots of ground-up innovation.
3. Today, I will not talk about all those. I will talk about AI innovation in healthcare from an organisational and leadership perspective. Because innovation and AI innovation, are fundamentally a human, and not a technological, endeavour.
A Unique Situation
4. The way healthcare uses AI is different from many other industries. We are not overwhelmed by it, in the way AI has disrupted the music, entertainment, film or even transport sectors, and digitalisation has totally revamped the telecommunications, retail or financial services sector.
5. It did not happen in healthcare because healthcare is an essential public service that cannot be substituted by technology alone. It is also very highly regulated. This means the determined and heavy hand of clinical governance can possibly keep out disruptive technological changes in a highly regulated environment like healthcare. We can just say it cannot be implemented – to our own detriment. In Singapore, of course, we are not going to do that.
6. On the other hand, healthcare systems around the world are disrupted by a separate force – the force of nature, which is demography, and the ageing population.
7. Hence, healthcare is in a unique and advantageous position. We are confronting the biggest challenge of our generation, which is ageing. We have AI technology on our side, which we are in a position to titrate, introducing it judiciously into our system to help us tackle our challenge.
8. This also means healthcare leaders are in a special position to envision the future, mobilise people and synergise human skills and AI to benefit our patients. With that in mind, let me offer three thoughts on what healthcare leaders need to do.
Strategy and Vision
9. First, leaders need to define and articulate our strategy – how are we serving our customers differently? What is the big change? What is the delta? We need to tell patients.
10. I find the example of the PSA Singapore rather inspiring. I used to oversee PSA as the Minister for Transport. PSA has been doing very well over the past few years. This is despite the COVID-19 pandemic, supply chain disruptions as well as a setback in global trade. Notwithstanding all these, container volumes are rising in PSA.
11. PSA’s ability to buck the trend, I would say, can be partly attributed to a clear strategy. It is strengthening Singapore’s position as a transhipment hub. How so? It develops a network of ports around the world, so that they can offer shipping line alternatives when there is a supply chain disruption. When the Suez Canal is blocked, there is an alternative. When the Panama Canal does not have enough water, there is an alternative. With its network of ports, it can do so. And it can plan routes for shipping lines around the world to derive maximum yield.
12. They have an AI-driven IT system made this strategy possible. But technology serves the strategy, not the other way round.
13. Where PSA saw opportunity in global supply chain disruptions, we have to contend with changing patient mix due to ageing. More patients are older, with complex multiple conditions. They need preventive care that avoids triggering those conditions, and continual care after they are discharged from hospitals.
14. Both preventive and continual care should be delivered in the community as much as possible. But today, too much healthcare is still accumulated at the acute hospitals, which is the most expensive, often too late in the course of disease progression, and not necessarily the best setting for patients.
15. The big change we need to bring about in healthcare today, is to deliver as much care as possible, especially preventive and continual care, through the community. We can do so by leveraging technology and transforming our manpower. That is our strategy.
16. If we can do that, healthcare becomes a life companion. It is all around us, not just in hospitals and clinics.
17. While in Saudi Arabia last year, my host showed me how a team of specialists was congregated in an operations room, attending via telehealth to patients in villages literally across the desert. It is a model that is driven by geographical necessity.
18. In the Netherlands, the company Buurtzorg, which means “neighbourhood care” in Dutch, is a dominant player in home nursing care. They are organised into small teams of nurses, 10 or 12 of them. Each team takes care of the seniors of an entire neighbourhood.
19. The nurses are empowered to do many things – assessing what the resident needs, tailoring the care plans, delivering medical and support services. There are no long chains of command or complex governance frameworks to navigate.
20. When the resident needs help, these nurses respond quickly and effectively. But they are very well-supported, with direct access to specialists and nurse coaches in the backend, and IT systems that put information at their fingertips.
21. Singapore too, has demonstrated exciting possibilities to the world. Now with Healthier SG, Age Well SG and Community Health Posts all over the island and firmly in place, we have a springboard to build community care for the future, as a core shift in our strategy.
Fears, Concerns, Hope and Confidence
22. The second thing is that leaders of organisations need to recognise that change instils fear and concern amongst people, and these need to be addressed decisively.
23. For example, workers will immediately worry that technology will render their service redundant and replace them. In an industry disrupted by technology and facing an uncertain future, it is better to be honest and forthright with our people. But as I mentioned earlier, this is not the scenario in healthcare. We are facing rising patient loads, and technology is a potential saviour.
24. I recall how several years ago, DBS Bank embarked on a major strategy to digitalise all their services. Workers were naturally worried, but the DBS leadership assured their staff that their jobs were safe, and in fact, they would be retrained to adapt to new roles, and to use technology. In the ensuing years, DBS’ share prices soared and at one point it was voted the best bank in the world.
25. Patients and the public may have concerns too. For healthcare to be delivered seamlessly across all settings, and especially in the community, a patient’s data needs to be captured and shared amongst healthcare providers whom the patient sought care from.
26. That immediately raises concerns about cybersecurity, which we are addressing by strengthening our IT infrastructure.
27. Patients will also be worried about data privacy. Can my patient data, which is so confidential, be shared amongst healthcare providers that I sought care from? We are therefore enacting new legislation, namely the proposed Health Information Act. Under the Act, beyond various data protection measures, a patient can choose to restrict the sharing of his medical data amongst the healthcare providers that he sought care from.
28. This is not an ideal arrangement and will undermine the quality of care for the patient. However, by making this choice available, it addresses fears and instils confidence. Based on experience around the world, the number that eventually exercised this restriction is actually very low. In the end, patients know what is best for them is to allow sharing, but the choice gives them the confidence that this is the right thing.
29. When there is greater availability of genetic data, there will be public concerns on how the data is used, and whether technology will inadvertently push us across societal ethical lines.
30. The Ministry of Health (MOH) is therefore also working on enhancing legislative protections on the use of genetic test information and will be conducting broad public consultations on this topic. The legislation will provide greater clarity on what genetic information can be used for, such as for medical treatment, and what it cannot be used for, such as for employment and insurance underwriting.
31. Beyond addressing the fears and concerns arising from technology, we can also usher in hope and confidence about the future of technology.
32. Everyone can be empowered to participate in innovation and leverage technology to do a better job. DBS, as I mentioned earlier, has managed to achieve this. 3M is another inspiring example, where its leaders encourage ground up innovation and allow employees to spend 15% of their time on projects unrelated to their work. That positive culture has turned 3M from a mining company into a diverse manufacturer, including in electronics and healthcare.
The Human Core
33. Final thing, and I think probably the most important but hardest to tackle, is that organisational leaders need to be careful not to devolve their core competencies to technology. As leaders, we also have a role to safeguard humanity.
34. We welcomed machines that could replace human labour. We applauded when computer software could process reams of paperwork in a moment, substituting human toil. We appreciated technology and servers that multiplied human memory. We were amazed when the miniaturisation of computing power revolutionised human communication and perception.
35. But with each advancement in technology, machines edge closer to the human core. We are happy to be relieved of labour, manual calculations, paperwork, even meeting face to face, but should we be happy when AI starts to replace human judgement, creativity, empathy and relationship?
36. We should bear in mind that even in the early phases of technological advancement that today we regard as unmitigated good, there were profound unintended negative consequences.
37. When machines substituted human labour, and today we think that is a great thing, but when it happened at that time, it triggered the Industrial Revolution. It led to the suppression of workers’ rights, which in turn gave rise to socialism, and that nearly triggered World War III.
38. As digital technology revolutionises human communications, it might have also rewired the minds of a whole generation. The evidence is still being debated, but ask any psychologist or counsellor, and they will tell you stories of how smart devices, video games or social media addiction have inflicted pain on young minds.
39. There is no doubt AI will have a profound impact on society and humanity. We just do not know the full extent yet. We have heard warnings about the potential loss of creativity, independent thinking, ability to learn, and the resilience to seek answers to difficult problems. We are probably scratching the surface.
40. Healthcare, beyond medical knowledge, is all about the qualities of being human. With the power of AI in our hands, healthcare institutions need to use it judiciously and deploy it thoughtfully.
41. Last year, I suggested a basic principle – make sure that healthcare is AI enhanced, AI enabled, but not AI decided. Let the doctor and healthcare professional decide. This is only a general principle, and I am probably oversimplifying it. But it needs to be interpreted and implemented wisely in healthcare institutions.
42. There is a good example in NHG Health, in the way it uses AI to read X-rays. AI will sieve out the normal readings and close the loop with the patients quickly, so they do not have to wait as long as they do today. But those with abnormal readings will still be attended to by clinicians. That way, healthcare professionals do not lose their core competency.
43. This is also why my current favourite AI use case is actually the systemwide automation of clinical documentation – significant productivity gain, with negligible impact on our core competencies and humanity. And I am very glad NHG Health has rolled out Note Buddy throughout its polyclinics. Note Buddy, as you know, is a SingHealth invention, so you can proudly say, Note Buddy is not invented here, but implemented here.
For People, By People
44. I am glad we are having this in-person conference to discuss AI in healthcare, and we should do more. We welcome more human connections and networking, locally and internationally, to figure out how best to seize this opportunity of a lifetime to improve healthcare. We need technology, AI, and human healthcare to coexist harmoniously.
45. To this end, MOH will be the first Asian country to join HealthAI’s Global Regulatory Network as one of its Pioneer Countries. HealthAI is a non-profit organisation to help governments implement and strengthen the governance and regulation of AI in the healthcare sector. We will contribute to this effort.
46. Two nights ago, I met the members of the HEAL Advisory Thinktank. Over dinner, we had a very interesting discussion, covering AI use cases in healthcare, the threat of AI dependency, humanity, awareness versus consciousness, and the afterlife. I must say that after that dinner, it inspired me to write this speech the next day. I wrote it without any AI assistance. But that said, if I had used AI, maybe it would have been a better speech. But it does not matter. With all its flaws, and whatever views that you do not agree with, it is authentically mine, inspired by the dinner, and maybe that is what matters. Thank you very much.