Bloomberg Businessweek Achieving Better Global Health Through Data Science
Sep 26, 2025
Dr. Joan LaRovere from the Virtue Foundation discusses how data science and AI are transforming global health. She shares insights on their initiatives to create a marketplace that matches healthcare needs with resources, particularly in low-income countries. The conversation delves into the challenges of conflicting medical guidance, the exciting potential of AI in healthcare, and the importance of patient-centered care. Innovations like VFMatch stand to enhance efficiency and scalability in addressing medical deserts.
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Official Statements Create Clinical Confusion
- Boston Children's fields calls and confusion from families after high-profile statements about pregnancy and medication.
- Dr. LaRovere highlights clinicians' need to address resulting patient questions directly.
AI Unlocks Enterprise-Scale Health Tools
- Dr. Joan LaRovere says AI, Gen AI, cloud and big data have unlocked far more actionable, enterprise-scale health tools than before.
- She argues current tools enable real-world use cases that were impossible 15 years ago.
Origin Story: Data Need In Burundi
- Dr. Joan LaRovere recounts how a colleague in Burundi realized the need for granular local data to inform action from afar.
- That moment launched Virtue Foundation's long effort to collect and visualize ground-level health data.