Health Nexus Forum
BUILDING INTELLIGENT HEALTH SYSTEMS: FROM LITERACY TO CLINICAL IMPACT
DAY 1 – WED, JUNE 24, De Hoorn (‘The Horn’), Leuven, Belgium
KEYNOTE ADDRESS:
Yannis Maniatis, Member of the European Parliament, Vice President of the Group of
Socialists & Democrats (S&D), f. Minister of Environment, Energy and Climate Change
Distinguished guests and dear friends,
First, I would like to thank the Nanopoulos Foundation for giving me the opportunity to address this extremely interesting event.
I will approach today’s topic from the perspective of an S&D representative, a policymaker, and a former minister from Greece – a peripheral, medium-sized EU Member State.
From this standpoint, I would like to focus on issues that are central to our discussion on “building intelligent health systems”: health policy effectiveness and efficiency, fairness, public investment, social cohesion, workforce support, and reduction of regional disparities.
Europe is facing a historic moment. Sea routes, energy corridors, new technologies, and critical raw materials are once again reshaping our economy, our security, and the daily lives of our citizens.
At the same time, the pendulum of history appears to be moving against the West. Deindustrialisation, inequality, overextension, and a deficit of leadership are converging with the rise of Asia. Europe and the United States have seen their share of global GDP decline, while China has significantly strengthened its economic and geopolitical confidence. This shift is unfolding alongside the climate crisis, the recent covid pandemic, misinformation, social polarisation, cyberattacks, U.S.–China competition, and the largely unregulated development of artificial intelligence. All these are creating a landscape of persistent uncertainty.
The issue, therefore, is not whether Europe must change course, but how it can do so without weakening the foundations of European integration: democracy, rights, stability, respect for international rules, and leadership in addressing European and global challenges, including massive health workforce shortages, the escalating impacts of climate change on health, persistent inequalities in healthcare access, and the lingering threat of pandemics.
In this evolving landscape, the two main themes of today’s discussion – healthcare systems and the use of artificial intelligence within them – are of paramount importance.
Today, Europe’s health systems face major challenges in a rapidly changing context. Demographic and epidemiological shifts, rising public expenditure in other policy objectives such as defence and climate, inequality, and technological change are placing welfare and health systems under growing pressure. Without coordinated adaptation, these pressures could deepen health inequalities and weaken health care sustainability. Strengthening health system effectiveness, accessibility, and resilience is therefore increasingly urgent.
The COVID-19 pandemic accelerated the digital transformation of health care across the EU and its Member States. Since the pre-pandemic period, investment in health-related ICT has risen by around 30%, and all Member States now offer some access to electronic health records (EHR).
In addition, Member States have allocated around €14.5 billion from the Recovery and Resilience Facility (RRF) to upgrade EHR systems, expand e-prescription services and develop telehealth platforms. Eventually, by the end of 2024, all EU Member States had implemented electronic health record (EHR) access services, with at least 80% of the population technically able to access their EHRs in 85% of countries.
This progress is already strengthening health system efficiency and resilience. However, public uptake remains limited, as only about 28% of EU citizens access their electronic health records, with significant differences across countries and socioeconomic groups.
The next phase should therefore focus on implementation at scale, by adapting to new technologies such as AI, ensuring security, improving interoperability, and strengthening digital skills and governance, so that wider adoption delivers consistent, measurable improvements across EU health systems.
Advances in artificial intelligence could significantly transform health systems. AI can support better care by helping to interpret medical imaging, predict clinical progression, automate administrative tasks, and provide data-driven insights for clinical decision-making.
Across the EU, Member States are already increasingly taking steps to make use of this potential.
Let me highlight four principles that should guide Europe as we bring artificial intelligence and digital tools into our health systems.
First, AI in healthcare must be treated as a political question of social rights. Its use should reinforce universal public healthcare, reduce waiting times, and improve diagnosis for all citizens, under strong democratic oversight and human responsibility. Equal access to AI-driven care also requires investment in digital and health literacy as public goods. AI introduction could be a unique opportunity to challenge and address existing health inequalities.
Second, Europe’s demographic challenge makes health AI a test of both cohesion and strategic autonomy. Ageing societies and workforce shortages are placing growing pressure on healthcare systems, especially in peripheral and less-resourced regions. If Europe wants AI to strengthen public health rather than deepen territorial inequalities, it must use cohesion policy to close the digital health gap while building its own trusted technological capacity. Strategic autonomy should therefore not be understood only as industrial independence, but as the capacity to guarantee equal access to essential innovation across all regions and generations. In this sense, cohesion, autonomy, and demographic resilience are part of the same political project: a Europe able to protect its citizens, reduce inequalities, and remain sovereign in the technologies that shape social rights.
Third, the legitimacy of health innovation depends on both public trust and measurable clinical value. Because health data constitutes highly sensitive personal information, the deployment of intelligent health systems must be governed by robust safeguards for privacy, transparency, and democratic accountability. At the same time, public investment in such technologies should be justified by obvious improvements in health outcomes, including earlier diagnoses, reduced hospitalisations, and enhanced quality of life for patients. Innovation should therefore be assessed not only by its technical sophistication, but by its capacity to serve effectively and efficiently citizens.
Fourth, healthcare workers must be supported. Europe faces shortages of doctors, nurses, and caregivers. Intelligent systems should reduce administrative burdens and give professionals more time with patients, improving both working conditions and quality of care.
To sum up, intelligent health systems must bring digital innovation together with social justice: empowering citizens through health literacy, supporting healthcare workers, protecting fundamental rights, and ensuring that technological progress benefits every European region.
Afterall, our citizens do not want technology for its own sake, but a health system they can trust. Intelligent health systems will ultimately be judged not by their sophistication, but by their ability to improve care, reduce inequalities, protect privacy and support health professionals.
Thank you
