Unproven medical chatbots worry this senator

The ideas and innovators shaping health care

Aug 08, 2023 View in browser   By Shawn Zeller, Evan Peng, Erin Schumaker and Daniel Payne TECH MAZE Warner's got some questions for Google. | Getty Images Sen. Mark Warner is worried that hospitals are integrating artificial intelligence from Google into medical decision-making before the technology is ready. The Virginia Democrat is in a position to do something about it, from his seat on the Finance Committee’s health panel. On Tuesday, he wrote to Google CEO Sundar Pichai to express his concern about “premature deployment of unproven technology.” The backstory: Google is collaborating with the Mayo Clinic in testing its Med-PaLM 2 chatbot and hopes to create an all-purpose virtual medical assistant. Med-PaLM 2 can already respond to medical questions, summarize doctors’ notes, and organize large data sets. The company in May said that physicians who’d reviewed Med-PaLM 2’s responses to medical questions overwhelmingly preferred them to answers written by doctors. Even so: Greg Corrado, a senior research director at Google who worked on Med-PaLM 2, told The Wall Street Journal that the product was still nascent. “I don’t feel that this kind of technology is yet at a place where I would want it in my family’s healthcare journey,” Corrado said. Warner’s questions: Corrado’s assessment worried the senator, who wants Pichai to provide more specifics about how Google and its partners are deploying the technology, safeguarding patient data, and ensuring its use doesn’t lead to “the erosion of trust in our medical professionals and institutions, the exacerbation of existing racial disparities in health outcomes, and an increased risk of diagnostic and care-delivery errors.” Google didn’t respond immediately to a request for comment.   A NEW PODCAST FROM POLITICO: Our new POLITICO Tech podcast is your daily download on the disruption that technology is bringing to politics and policy around the world. From AI and the metaverse to disinformation and cybersecurity, POLITICO Tech explores how today’s technology is shaping our world — and driving the policy decisions, innovations and industries that will matter tomorrow. SUBSCRIBE AND START LISTENING TODAY.     WELCOME TO FUTURE PULSE Puzhehei, China | Evan Peng This is where we explore the ideas and innovators shaping health care. Better brain function could be just one sniff away, according to preliminary research that found stimulating smells could improve memory. Share any thoughts, news, tips and feedback with Carmen Paun at cpaun@politico.com, Daniel Payne at dpayne@politico.com, Evan Peng at epeng@politico.com or Erin Schumaker at eschumaker@politico.com. Send tips securely through SecureDrop, Signal, Telegram or WhatsApp. Today on our Pulse Check podcast, host Ben Leonard talks with Alice Miranda Ollstein, who describes the challenges facing Reps. Brad Wenstrup (R-Ohio) and Raul Ruiz (D-Calif.) as chair and ranking member of the committee investigating the government response to Covid-19 — and how their inability to find common ground on the pandemic response threatens their 10-year bipartisan collaboration and friendship while raising concerns about further erosion of public trust in government. Listen to today’s Pulse Check podcast AROUND THE NATION Pennsylvania has promised to take a more lenient position on past substance use in evaluating foster parents. | AP Pennsylvania has agreed to reform its child welfare practices to protect the rights of people recovering from substance use disorders, as required under federal disability law. The state’s agreement with the civil rights arm of the federal Department of Health and Human Services resolves a complaint from an individual being treated for substance use disorder, who was prevented from applying to be a foster parent by a county-operated child welfare agency. HHS said the state hadn’t adequately overseen the county agency. Pennsylvania will voluntarily: — Refrain from discrimination against people with disabilities, including people in treatment for opioid use disorder — Designate a coordinator to oversee compliance with federal disability laws — Adopt a nondiscrimination policy emphasizing that people with substance use disorders are entitled to federal disability protections in specific circumstances — Establish a procedure for people to file complaints   YOUR TICKET INSIDE THE GOLDEN STATE POLITICAL ARENA: California Playbook delivers the latest intel, buzzy scoops and exclusive coverage from Sacramento and Los Angeles to Silicon Valley and across the state. Don't miss out on the daily must-read for political aficionados and professionals with an outsized interest in California politics, policy and power. Subscribe today.     CONNECTING THE DOTS New research says there's a link between air pollution and antibiotic resistance. | Ian Britton/Flickr An increase in air pollution might be driving up antibiotic resistance, a new study in the Lancet found. Researchers in China and the U.K. analyzed data from 2000 to 2018 across 116 countries and found a correlation between increases in air pollution and a rise in cases where antibiotics were ineffective in clearing bacterial infections. The relationship between the two has become stronger over time: Growth in air pollution levels have coincided with larger and larger increases in antibiotic resistance. How so? Past research has found abundant antibiotic-resistant bacteria in the major air pollutant, the fine particulate matter known as PM2.5. That finding suggests breathing in PM2.5 leads to antibiotic resistance. Why it matters: Antibiotic resistance poses a significant threat to public health: One estimate puts the number of premature deaths linked to ineffective antibiotics at 1.27 million in 2019. Air pollution is also a pressing public health crisis responsible for millions of premature deaths annually. Finding ways to reduce the latter could help mitigate the effects of the former. The researchers’ modeling found that meeting World Health Organization air-quality guidelines by 2050 could lead to a 23 percent reduction in premature deaths linked to antibiotic resistance. Even so: Antibiotic misuse and overuse are the main drivers of antibiotic resistance.   Follow us on Twitter Carmen Paun @carmenpaun Daniel Payne @_daniel_payne Ruth Reader @RuthReader Erin Schumaker @erinlschumaker Evan Peng @thepngfile   Follow us

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