Dear EUPHA Digital Health and AI members,

As we step into this year, we’re pleased to share the first EUPHA Digital Health & Artificial Intelligence (DHAI) newsletter for 2026.

A few months have passed since the 18th European Public Health Conference in Helsinki, but the momentum from #EPH2025 is still very much alive. The DH&AI section contributed sessions and discussions focused on how digital health and AI can support healthier, more resilient systems, and many of those themes are now translating into concrete next steps. If you missed the conference, you can still find highlights and key takeaways on our social media channels, and we’re always happy to connect at euphadhai@gmail.com

Looking ahead, 2026 is shaping up to be a busy and exciting year for the Section, with new activities already in the pipeline, including a dedicated webinar series and other initiatives we’ll share soon.

Best regards,

The EUPHA DH&AI Team

1. Editorial

The accelerating pace of investment by leading AI companies into healthcare marks a pivotal and urgent moment for the public health community. The emergence of sophisticated, large-scale models, exemplified by products like ChatGPT Health and Claude for Healthcare, signals a new era where vast private capital and advanced technology are poised to transform diagnostics, care delivery, and population health at scale. This commercial influx promises to unlock efficiencies and offer unprecedented tools for health systems.

However, the future of AI in public health will be shaped not only by proprietary giants but also by the collaborative spirit of the open-source community. Open-source initiatives are critical for ensuring AI systems are transparent, auditable, and ultimately trustworthy. A prime example of this vital work is the OpenMed Dataset, which focuses on medical reasoning and provides a public resource for researchers globally. This community effort fosters independent scrutiny, accelerates academic progress, and offers a crucial counterbalance to proprietary development, ensuring that innovation benefits the entire scientific community.

This rapid advancement has rightly prompted an equally urgent response from regulatory bodies. The work being done by the NHS in the UK, particularly its call for evidence for the Regulation of AI in Healthcare, highlights the global commitment to establishing robust governance. Such regulatory measures are essential to ensure patient safety, protect data privacy, and maintain clinical and ethical accountability as AI tools are integrated into routine public health practice.Implications for Public Health

The impact of these developments on public health is profound, shifting our focus to population-level strategy and operational excellence:

• System Optimization and Policy: AI offers the potential for AI-driven simulation and optimization of public health policies for enhanced decision-making and outcomes, moving beyond simple data collection to predictive action.
• Workforce Preparedness: The public health workforce must rapidly adapt. As highlighted in current research topics, there is an urgent need for integrating digital competencies in public health curricula and defining what a “Public Health Workforce for the Digital Age” truly means.
• Equity and Access: The core challenge for public health is ensuring that the benefits of multi-billion-dollar investments and cutting-edge open-source tools are distributed equitably, avoiding a widening gap in health outcomes between populations with and without access to these technologies.
• Global Governance: Collaborative efforts, such as the Section’s new GUIDE-AI project, are essential for mapping stakeholders and co-developing international guidance for responsible AI use, ensuring global standards are met before widespread implementation.

As we navigate this landscape, the public health community must reflect on and actively address these critical questions:

1. Transparency and Trust: How do we ensure that both proprietary and open-source models are sufficiently transparent to allow for validation, address bias, and earn the trust of both clinicians and the public?
2. Data Sovereignty and Sharing: Given the massive data requirements of AI, what frameworks—such as federated learning and privacy-preserving techniques—will be necessary to mitigate data silo challenges while protecting patient and population privacy?
3. Ethical Oversight: We must move beyond general ethics and adopt a rigorous, evidence-based approach—using epidemiology as a guide—to mitigate AI misalignment across its entire lifecycle.
4. Defining Success: Our reflection must center on public health outcomes. How do we ensure that the focus of these powerful new tools remains on healthier, more resilient systems for all, rather than merely on technological sophistication or commercial returns?

The convergence of corporate investment, open collaboration, and regulatory action presents an unparalleled opportunity for a digital health and AI transformation. Our response must be strategic, ethical, and unwavering in its focus on population well-being.

Stefan Buttigieg

2. Call for interest “Section Webinars”

We are launching a new series of Section Webinars in 2026, and we would like to co-design it with you all! Please let us know which topics you would like to discuss, whether you would attend, and if you would be willing to help shape the programme (e.g., suggesting speakers, moderating sessions, or supporting communications). Our main goal is to recruit a small team to organise the webinar series together with the Section leadership. If you are interested, contact us at euphadhai@gmail.com. We will follow up and start scheduling the webinars.

3. Learning opportunity: AI in Public Health (PAHO)

The Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) has launched a free, self-paced AI in Public Health online programme on the Virtual Campus for Public Health, designed to delve into practical cases and the strategic implications of this technology in the health sector. Participants can follow the modules at their own pace and choose when to complete the final assessments.

Currently available:

• Module 1: Digital Health
• Module 2: Artificial intelligence in Health

4. Spotlight on AI & Public Health – recent publications worth reading 

• Now is the time: turning the promise of AI into health for all
• Mind the (widening) gap: why public health must engage with AI now
• Artificial intelligence is reshaping health systems: state of readiness across the WHO European Region
• AI chatbots for promoting healthy habits: Legal, ethical, and societal considerations
• Guiding artificial intelligence in public health and medicine with epidemiology: A lifecycle framework for mitigating AI misalignment
• Holistic AI in medicine; improved performance and explainability
• Machine Learning Applications in Population and Public Health: Guidelines for Development, Testing, and Implementation
• Can digital technologies and artificial intelligence enhance co-creation in public health?
• Artificial Intelligence and the Public Health Workforce—Preparing for Our Future
• AI regulatory strategies: a global public health perspective
• Post-pandemic era: global trends, benefits, and barriers in integrating artificial intelligence into public health education

5. Special Issues – Call for Papers

Npj Digital Public Health and npj Digital Medicine have an ongoing call for “AI for Population Medicine and Public Health”. This collection invites research on

• early detection and warning using big data,
• tracing of pathogens through advanced algorithms
• AI-driven simulation and optimization of public health policies for enhanced decision-making and outcomes
• AI-driven dynamic risk stratification for enhanced management of chronic diseases
• advanced methods leveraging AI to enhance clinical pathway optimization and streamline resource allocation in healthcare systems
• AI for wearable devices
• multimodal fusion to effectively utilize the complementary characteristics of multiple data streams that are common in population medicine and public health
• translational use of edge computing in resource-constrained environments
• federated learning and privacy preserving to mitigate data silo challenges
• foundational models for downstream tasks in population medicine and public health

Submission deadline: 15 May 2026

Further, our section‘s research topic in Frontiers in Public Health on “A Public Health Workforce for the Digital Age: Digital Skills and Technologies in Public Health Education and Training” has prolonged its submission period and now accepts full manuscripts until April 30, 2026.

This Research Topic welcomes articles on:

• Defining and operationalising public health competencies
• Integrating digital competencies in public health curricula
• Applying digital tools in public health education and training
• Public health labor market and digital transformations
• Continuous professional development in digital public health
• Access to and equity in digital public health education and training.

6. Transatlantic stakeholder mapping, policy analysis, and co-development of future guidance for responsible AI use in Healthcare and Public Health (GUIDE-AI)

We are pleased to share that a new Section-led project coordinated by Dr Laura Maaß has been funded. Building on collaborations across Europe and Canada, the initiative will convene researchers and policy stakeholders through in-person retreats and workshops (Bremen, Montréal, Pisa) and online meetings in 2026. The project aims to lay the groundwork for a broader international consortium and a follow-up research proposal focused on (i) mapping key actors shaping AI in health and public health, (ii) comparing governance and policy frameworks, and (iii) co-developing guidance and knowledge-transfer approaches to support responsible, equitable implementation.

7. Open positions!

University of Vienna – E-STEEM (Empowering Women in STEM and Economics)
The University of Vienna is offering ≥20 fully funded postdoctoral positions (4 years, full-time) for women researchers in natural sciences, life sciences, and economics. Find out more 

PhD position in Games in Science Communication for patients at the University of Bamberg. Find out more  

8. Contribute to the section newsletter and social!

Thank you for reading the second edition of our renewed newsletter. As your Communication Pillar, I’d love to hear your thoughts and suggestions on this evolving format. We want the newsletter to become a dynamic and valuable resource for everyone in our section. If you come across interesting articles, upcoming conferences or webinars, job opportunities, or if you have any feedback to share, please don’t hesitate to get in touch!

Dr. Francesco Baglivo