AI for Public Good: Managing Health Risks and Opportunities

Abstract

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is reshaping public health paradigms, offering transformative benefits while posing novel legal and ethical challenges. This chapter explores AI’s role in advancing health as a global public good, emphasizing the need for a rights based, equity oriented governance framework. It redefines the concept of "public good" in the digital health era, analyzing how AI technologies intersect with the right to health and ethical imperatives outlined by WHO, UNESCO, and UNHRC. The chapter examines AI applications in disease surveillance, diagnostics, telemedicine, and precision medicine, highlighting both their promise and the risks of algorithmic bias, data inequities, and cybersecurity threats. It scrutinizes the Indian legal ecosystem including the IT Act 2000 and the Digital Personal Data Protection Act 2023 alongside global regulatory frameworks such as the EU Artificial Intelligence Act 2024, US FDA guidelines, and WHO's governance principles for health AI. Through a comparative legal lens, the chapter advocates for ethical AI deployment via transparency, explainability, and institutional capacity building. It proposes policy innovations like ethics by design, regulatory sandboxes, and public private collaboration to align AI with public health values. The chapter offers a roadmap for inclusive, accountable, and resilient AI governance that upholds human dignity in global health systems.