UAE-Israel collaboration to bring innovation in healthcare, medical tech
The two nations can work together “to transform health care, not just in two countries, but in the entire region.”
By HANNAH BROWNPanel - HeathTech and HealthCare - Achieving the unimaginable
In two sessions of the UAE-Israel Peace and Prosperity Roundtable presented by The Khaleej Times and The Jerusalem Post at the 2021 Business Summit, medical professionals, medical technology entrepreneurs and public health officials from Israel and the UAE outlined ways in which technology can improve the future of medicine, and how UAE-Israeli partnerships can further develop and enhance innovation in this field.In a session moderated by Abdul Karim Hanif of The Khaleej Times with Sherif Beshara, group CEO of the American Hospital, and Dr. Mohammed al-Redha, director of Projects Management Office, Dubai Health Authority, titled, “HealthTech and HealthCare: Achieving the Unimaginable,” these professionals stressed the value of this international collaboration in medicine and technology.While both countries can learn from how the other has coped with the COVID-19 pandemic and, most recently, the vaccine rollout, this is only one way in which the two nations can help each other improve healthcare, the two men said.“The vaccine is only a stepping-stone,” said Redha. He emphasized that “the more collaboration, the more innovation that will be built from this relationship.” He said that not only the region but “the entire world is waiting on collaborations between the two sides to come up with exciting innovations.”Beshara outlined many ways in which the two nations can work together “to transform healthcare, not just in the two countries but in the entire region.”Medical tourism – in both directions – is another avenue in which the countries can collaborate, Beshara and Redha agreed.Beshara noted that even before the accords were signed, the American Hospital was approached by an Israeli hospital looking to collaborate on AI and medical data, and said that there would be progress to announce soon in both of these areas.In a session with Maayan Hoffman, the Post’s news editor, Ohad Arazi, the CEO of Zebra Medical Vision Ltd. in Israel, said his company “has been on a mission to transform patient care by teaching computers to automatically read and diagnose medical imaging studies... and to shed light on chronic diseases which are typically underreported.”AI can improve coronavirus healthcare, Arazi said. “If you want precision healthcare for COVID, you need to examine patients more closely,” and Arazi’s company has developed an algorithm that analyzes lung CT scans of coronavirus patients to help doctors decide how to best allocate precious resources.Beshara said that the healthcare sector looked to be “the big winner” out of all the fields in which both countries are now partnering.“It’s time to build a hub for healthcare transformation” in the Middle East, he said.