By Kristin Ryan, EVP, AI Transformation & Acceleration
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Bill Gates posted a new memo on AI and the concerns he has – below is a POV and what it means for us: https://www.gatesnotes.com/a-turbulent-ai-era-and-critical-choices-to-make
Bill Gates just published one of the more important pieces I've read about AI recently, and there is a message in it that healthcare marketers should pay close attention to. His argument is essentially this: AI could become the greatest equalizer we've ever created—or a powerful new source of inequality. And which one it becomes depends on choices we're making now.
Healthcare is one of the areas where Gates sees enormous potential. AI could help physicians diagnose patients, expand access to expertise in underserved communities, help patients understand test results and medication schedules, accelerate research and make healthcare information and support more accessible. That being said, one of Gates' most interesting ideas is what he calls "Human Reserved": things technology may technically be capable of doing, but which we deliberately choose to keep human. For example, AI could technically tell someone they have an incurable disease, but that doesn't mean it should.
What does this mean for those of us responsible for health information, communications, and experiences?
We aren't just communicating to patients and HCPs. We're communicating into an ecosystem where AI sits between our information and our audiences.
Patients show up to AI answer engines with specific health questions: Should I be worried about this symptom? What does this lab result mean? What treatments should I ask my doctor about? As healthcare marketers, stewardship of health information—not just visibility—is becoming an increasingly important responsibility. We need to understand not only what content about diseases and treatments is appearing in AI answers, but also whether that answer is accurate, appropriately sourced, and within the bounds of what an organization has the authority and responsibility to address. We recommend:Healthcare organizations should start identifying which moments across the patient and HCP journey should be AI-led vs. AI-assisted vs. Human-led vs. Human-only.
As AI makes personalization easier, we need to be careful not to confuse synthetic empathy with human connection. This means setting clear standards around AI identity, disclosure, emotional language, anthropomorphism and human escalation—especially when communicating with vulnerable populations.
Protect critical thinking. A great communications partner increasingly needs to be AI literate—knowing how to challenge AI outputs, interrogate sources, recognize bias and hallucinations, distinguish synthesis from evidence and know when human expertise needs to override the machine.
Develop next-generation talent through deliberate apprenticeship and upskilling that build future AI-enabled experts and innovative leaders.
Stewardship is the name of the game in the next chapter of AI. We aren’t focused on just speeding up work, we need to decide where AI should belong, what humans should own, what AI should be able to say about health and what information can it find. We've spent the last few years asking what AI can do. The much more important question now may be: What do we want it to do—and what don't we?
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